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catholicism and the Jewish people - a test case for authority
- Thread starter Australian Baptist Student
- Start date
Still missin . . . I mean dodging the point. How does the Fourth Lateran Council sound?
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Valley/8920/churchcouncils/Ecum12.htm#Jews and excessive Usury
67. Jews and excessive Usury
The more the christian religion is restrained from usurious practices, so much the more does the perfidy of the Jews grow in these matters, so that within a short time they are exhausting the resources of Christians. Wishing therefore to see that Christians are not savagely oppressed by Jews in this matter, we ordain by this synodal decree that if Jews in future, on any pretext, extort oppressive and excessive interest from Christians, then they are to be removed from contact with Christians until they have made adequate satisfaction for the immoderate burden. Christians too, if need be, shall be compelled by ecclesiastical censure, without the possibility of an appeal, to abstain from commerce with them. We enjoin upon princes not to be hostile to Christians on this account, but rather to be zealous in restraining Jews from so great oppression. We decree, under the same penalty, that Jews shall be compelled to make satisfaction to churches for tithes and offerings due to the churches, which the churches were accustomed to receive from Christians for houses and other possessions, before they passed by whatever title to the Jews, so that the churches may thus be preserved from loss.
68. Jews appearing in public
A difference of dress distinguishes Jews or Saracens from Christians in some provinces, but in others a certain confusion has developed so that they are indistinguishable. Whence it sometimes happens that by mistake Christians join with Jewish or Saracen women, and Jews or Saracens with christian women. In order that the offence of such a damnable mixing may not spread further, under the excuse of a mistake of this kind, we decree that such persons of either sex, in every christian province and at all times, are to be distinguished in public from other people by the character of their dress -- seeing moreover that this was enjoined upon them by Moses himself, as we read. They shall not appear in public at all on the days of lamentation and on passion Sunday; because some of them on such days, as we have heard, do not blush to parade in very ornate dress and are not afraid to mock Christians who are presenting a memorial of the most sacred passion and are displaying signs of grief. What we most strictly forbid however, is that they dare in any way to break out in derision of the Redeemer. We order secular princes to restrain with condign punishment those who do so presume, lest they dare to blaspheme in any way him who was crucified for us, since we ought not to ignore insults against him who blotted out our wrongdoings.
69. Jews not to hold public offices
It would be too absurd for a blasphemer of Christ to exercise power over Christians. We therefore renew in this canon, on account of the boldness of the offenders, what the council of Toledo providently decreed in this matter : we forbid Jews to be appointed to public offices, since under cover of them they are very hostile to Christians. If, however, anyone does commit such an office to them let him, after an admonition, be curbed by the provincial council, which we order to be held annually, by means of an appropriate sanction. Any official so appointed shall be denied commerce with Christians in business and in other matters until he has converted to the use of poor Christians, in accordance with the directions of the diocesan bishop, whatever he has obtained from Christians by reason of his office so acquired, and he shall surrender with shame the office which he irreverently assumed. We extend the same thing to pagans.
70. Jewish converts may not retain their old rite
Certain people who have come voluntarily to the waters of sacred baptism, as we learnt, do not wholly cast off the old person in order to put on the new more perfectly. For, in keeping remnants of their former rite, they upset the decorum of the christian religion by such a mixing. Since it is written, cursed is he who enters the land by two paths, and a garment that is woven from linen and wool together should not be put on, we therefore decree that such people shall be wholly prevented by the prelates of churches from observing their old rite, so that those who freely offered themselves to the christian religion may be kept to its observance by a salutary and necessary coercion. For it is a lesser evil not to know the Lord's way than to go back on it after having known it.
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Valley/8920/churchcouncils/Ecum12.htm#Jews and excessive Usury
67. Jews and excessive Usury
The more the christian religion is restrained from usurious practices, so much the more does the perfidy of the Jews grow in these matters, so that within a short time they are exhausting the resources of Christians. Wishing therefore to see that Christians are not savagely oppressed by Jews in this matter, we ordain by this synodal decree that if Jews in future, on any pretext, extort oppressive and excessive interest from Christians, then they are to be removed from contact with Christians until they have made adequate satisfaction for the immoderate burden. Christians too, if need be, shall be compelled by ecclesiastical censure, without the possibility of an appeal, to abstain from commerce with them. We enjoin upon princes not to be hostile to Christians on this account, but rather to be zealous in restraining Jews from so great oppression. We decree, under the same penalty, that Jews shall be compelled to make satisfaction to churches for tithes and offerings due to the churches, which the churches were accustomed to receive from Christians for houses and other possessions, before they passed by whatever title to the Jews, so that the churches may thus be preserved from loss.
68. Jews appearing in public
A difference of dress distinguishes Jews or Saracens from Christians in some provinces, but in others a certain confusion has developed so that they are indistinguishable. Whence it sometimes happens that by mistake Christians join with Jewish or Saracen women, and Jews or Saracens with christian women. In order that the offence of such a damnable mixing may not spread further, under the excuse of a mistake of this kind, we decree that such persons of either sex, in every christian province and at all times, are to be distinguished in public from other people by the character of their dress -- seeing moreover that this was enjoined upon them by Moses himself, as we read. They shall not appear in public at all on the days of lamentation and on passion Sunday; because some of them on such days, as we have heard, do not blush to parade in very ornate dress and are not afraid to mock Christians who are presenting a memorial of the most sacred passion and are displaying signs of grief. What we most strictly forbid however, is that they dare in any way to break out in derision of the Redeemer. We order secular princes to restrain with condign punishment those who do so presume, lest they dare to blaspheme in any way him who was crucified for us, since we ought not to ignore insults against him who blotted out our wrongdoings.
69. Jews not to hold public offices
It would be too absurd for a blasphemer of Christ to exercise power over Christians. We therefore renew in this canon, on account of the boldness of the offenders, what the council of Toledo providently decreed in this matter : we forbid Jews to be appointed to public offices, since under cover of them they are very hostile to Christians. If, however, anyone does commit such an office to them let him, after an admonition, be curbed by the provincial council, which we order to be held annually, by means of an appropriate sanction. Any official so appointed shall be denied commerce with Christians in business and in other matters until he has converted to the use of poor Christians, in accordance with the directions of the diocesan bishop, whatever he has obtained from Christians by reason of his office so acquired, and he shall surrender with shame the office which he irreverently assumed. We extend the same thing to pagans.
70. Jewish converts may not retain their old rite
Certain people who have come voluntarily to the waters of sacred baptism, as we learnt, do not wholly cast off the old person in order to put on the new more perfectly. For, in keeping remnants of their former rite, they upset the decorum of the christian religion by such a mixing. Since it is written, cursed is he who enters the land by two paths, and a garment that is woven from linen and wool together should not be put on, we therefore decree that such people shall be wholly prevented by the prelates of churches from observing their old rite, so that those who freely offered themselves to the christian religion may be kept to its observance by a salutary and necessary coercion. For it is a lesser evil not to know the Lord's way than to go back on it after having known it.
Third Lateran Council:
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Valley/8920/churchcouncils/Ecum11.htm#canons
26. Jews and Saracens are not to be allowed to have christian servants in their houses, either under pretence of nourishing their children or for service or any other reason. Let those be excommunicated who presume to live with them. We declare that the evidence of Christians is to be accepted against Jews in every case, since Jews employ their own witnesses against Christians, and that those who prefer Jews to Christians in this matter are to lie under anathema, since Jews ought to be subject to Christians and to be supported by them on grounds of humanity alone. If any by the inspiration of God are converted to the christian faith, they are in no way to be excluded from their possessions, since the condition of converts ought to be better than before their conversion. If this is not done, we enjoin on the princes and rulers of these places, under penalty of excommunication, the duty to restore fully to these converts the share of their inheritance and goods.
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Valley/8920/churchcouncils/Ecum11.htm#canons
26. Jews and Saracens are not to be allowed to have christian servants in their houses, either under pretence of nourishing their children or for service or any other reason. Let those be excommunicated who presume to live with them. We declare that the evidence of Christians is to be accepted against Jews in every case, since Jews employ their own witnesses against Christians, and that those who prefer Jews to Christians in this matter are to lie under anathema, since Jews ought to be subject to Christians and to be supported by them on grounds of humanity alone. If any by the inspiration of God are converted to the christian faith, they are in no way to be excluded from their possessions, since the condition of converts ought to be better than before their conversion. If this is not done, we enjoin on the princes and rulers of these places, under penalty of excommunication, the duty to restore fully to these converts the share of their inheritance and goods.
Australian Baptist Student
New Member
Hi there, I have been careful to use mainly caholic historians, in order to avoid charges of bias. The catholic priest, E. Flannery, "The Anguish of the Jews", Scotish catholic, Malcome Hay, "Thy Brother's Blood", Austrian catholic, F. Heer, "God's First love" and American catholic, Henry Cargas.
Re your second point, since when are the Jewish people criminals?? Every Jew, rom baby to eldest, was locked up in the ghettoes for 400 years, including those Jews living in Rome under the direct rule of the popes. Was every Jew guilty??
Their only crime was they were not catholics. Jesus commanded us to love our neighbours, and used the example of someone from a different religion and race to make his point. He commanded we love those who are not of our group (even tax collectors can manage that), yet your church, in total violation of the commands of Jesus, jails all Jews simply because they are Jews! Do you find this a problem? Read the posts re what church councils and popes declared. How was being Jewish a "civil crime"? The popes wrote to the kings of Spain and England demanding that they be more anti-Jewish. This was not a civil matter, but was led by the catholic church. As noted, even in the 1930s, it was the catholic church in Poland, at its highest and most official level, that demanded Catholics boycott all Jewish stores, and prohibit Jews from living or working among them.
Take care, Colin
Australian Baptist Student
New Member
Dear Ed, I have been committed to Jewish evangelism for most of my life. Ask many Jewish people about Christianity or joining a church, and they reply, "why would I want to join a group that has murdered, persecuted and hated my people for about 1700 years??" A fair point, as Jesus said to judge a tree by its fruit. I often think to misquote Paul, "because of you, My name is blasphemed among the Jews." Catholic history and state protestant history are the main blocks to Jewish evangelism. All I can do is to agree that catholic history is full of profound official sin, and try and stear them onto the Bible, and the love of Jesus. To then find old cardinal newman saying, "to study history is to be a catholic", and that you see your history as infallable re morals causes me angst.
When a pope in an official letter states that sacred canons do not permit Jews to live in society, but require him to wall them into ghettoes, I must ask you some questions.
1) I assume the pope knows more about canon law and catholic theology than me (yes, this isn't a question - sorry).
2)If you had lived in Rome at that time, and had holy father quoting canon law to you, would you have obeyed him, and forced Jews into a walled up ghetto (and thereby broken God's clear commandments), or would you have, on the basis of God's word, refused to do what the pope and bishops commanded you to?
3) If you had lived in Poland in the 1930s, would you have obeyed the desicions of your synod of bishops, and descriminated against Jews (thereby breaking God's commands to love your neighbour), or would you have disobeyed your synod of bishops to show kindness to the stranger in your midst?
Is the church your final authority, or God's holy word?
4) A more neutral question, what is the status of papal bulls and national synods within the catholic church?
Take care, Colin
Australian Baptist Student
New Member
Dan, catholic priests and a catholic saint tortured Jews to extract confessions that they had "descecrated the host". Jewish testimony before tourture is that such an idea never entered their minds. These same priests swore in open court that the bread wept, grew wings, flew, pleaded etc. Do you believe that bread does these things? Or were these priests lying? The Jewish people did not tourture bread, and the doctrine of transubstantiation was the basis on which these murderous lies were told. Without that doctrine, the charge makes no sence. It was a religious charge, made by church officials, and the theological basis of it was the doctrine of transubstantiation. That is the link. This doctrine, in the hands of Catholic priests, has led to the murder of thousands of Jews.
A similar history is that of "child martyrs". The idea that Jews kidnap and kill christian children to use their blood to make passover bread. It was repeated within the Vatican semi-official paper into the late 1800s. Hundreds of false charges of this nature were made across europe, (even in 1946). The interesting thing for you is that, while Simon of Trent was made a saint, and Pope Benedict issued a bull on Blessed Andrew of Rinn, the catholic church generally rejected the idea as false. Interestingly also, re Simon of Trent, the vatican has now decided that it was the "piety of the faithful" independant of the truth or falseness of the charge, that is the reason for his sainthood. This is somewhat confusing for those faithful, as "authenticated miracles" and large annual pilgrimages to the sites of the so called child martyrs fueled anti Jewish sentiment. In 1913, after a ritual murder case where the pope was asked but refused to denounce the libel, the French catholic paper ’Univers stated that “no pope could ever in principle deny the ritual murder charge, for the Holy See had officially recognised Jewish ritual
murder by canonising Simon of Trent and other Christian martyrs who were such victims
of the Jews.” In 1914, the Civilta Cattolica likewise affirmed the charge. Popes had however denyed the charge (thank God), but the Vatican clearly vascillated on the issue. I will check, but I think Saint Simon has been de Sainted of recent.
So, while some popes and churches agreed that Jews killed children to use their blood, other popes and churches came out against the idea, and said it was a lie. Interestingly, a church in Poland, near Auschwitz to this day has a large painting done by some Italian rennasance guy, showing evil looking Jews killing a Christian child for Passover in it. What message of the love of Jesus do children of thet church get as they gaze at that picture week after week?
Take care, Colin
Australian Baptist Student
New Member
Hi Lisa, I have enjoyed your posts on a number of threads. Excellent Biblical and historical research,
God bless, Colin
"Re your second point, since when are the Jewish people criminals?? Every Jew, from baby to eldest, was locked up in the ghettoes for 400 years, including those Jews living in Rome under the direct rule of the popes. Was every Jew guilty??"
I wasn't addressing every point in your earlier screed. I was replying to your point about John of Capistrano and the desecration of Hosts by heretics and Jews. I don't know if every Jew was guilty of Host desecration. As it happened 500+- years ago I don't have any idea. I find it amazing if you think that it never happened.
As for Jews in ghettoes--they weren't prisons so don't overstate your point again. Unfortunately I can't find anything objective on this on the internet so can't really post a reply.
As for the pre-WWII Church and Cardinal Pacelli--later to become Pope Pius XII--
In Jerusalem the Palestine Post on March 6, 1939, confirmed: “The cordial reception accorded the election, particularly in France, England and America--and the lukewarm reception in Germany--are not surprising when we remember the large part he [Pacelli] played in the recent papal opposition to pernicious race theories.”
On March 3, 1939, correspondent William L. Shirer recorded in his famous Berlin Diary, “Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli is the new Pope, elected yesterday, and a very popular choice all around except perhaps in Germany.”
The Berlin Local Anzeiger declared that “The election of Cardinal Pacelli is not accepted with favor in Germany because he was always opposed to Nazism and practically determined the policies of the Vatican under his predecessor.”
[Re selection of Pacelli as Pope] The morning after his election, the Berlin Morgenpost reported: "The election of Cardinal Pacelli is not accepted with favor in Germany because he was always opposed to Nazism and practically determined the policies of the Vatican under his predecessor."
Doesn't sound as if the Nazis were too happy with the selection.
In 1928, the Vatican issued a statement declaring that the Church, “just as it reproves all rancours in conflicts between peoples, to the maximum extent condemns hatred of the people once chosen by God, the hatred that commonly goes by the name of anti-Semitism.”
The October 11, 1930 edition of L'Osservatore Romano declared: "Belonging to the Nationalist Socialist Party of Hitler is irreconcilable with the Catholic Conscience." This was reprinted in diocesan newspapers around the world, and especially in Germany.
[Pius XI in 1938] "Mark well that in the Catholic Mass, Abraham is our Patriarch and forefather. Anti-Semitism is incompatible with the lofty thought, which that fact expresses. It is a movement with which we Christians can have nothing to do. No, no, I say to you it is impossible for a Christian to take part in anti-Semitism. It is inadmissible. Through Christ and in Christ we are the spiritual progeny of Abraham. Spiritually, we are all Semites."
Doesn't sound too harsh recently, does it?
I wasn't addressing every point in your earlier screed. I was replying to your point about John of Capistrano and the desecration of Hosts by heretics and Jews. I don't know if every Jew was guilty of Host desecration. As it happened 500+- years ago I don't have any idea. I find it amazing if you think that it never happened.
As for Jews in ghettoes--they weren't prisons so don't overstate your point again. Unfortunately I can't find anything objective on this on the internet so can't really post a reply.
As for the pre-WWII Church and Cardinal Pacelli--later to become Pope Pius XII--
In Jerusalem the Palestine Post on March 6, 1939, confirmed: “The cordial reception accorded the election, particularly in France, England and America--and the lukewarm reception in Germany--are not surprising when we remember the large part he [Pacelli] played in the recent papal opposition to pernicious race theories.”
On March 3, 1939, correspondent William L. Shirer recorded in his famous Berlin Diary, “Eugenio Cardinal Pacelli is the new Pope, elected yesterday, and a very popular choice all around except perhaps in Germany.”
The Berlin Local Anzeiger declared that “The election of Cardinal Pacelli is not accepted with favor in Germany because he was always opposed to Nazism and practically determined the policies of the Vatican under his predecessor.”
[Re selection of Pacelli as Pope] The morning after his election, the Berlin Morgenpost reported: "The election of Cardinal Pacelli is not accepted with favor in Germany because he was always opposed to Nazism and practically determined the policies of the Vatican under his predecessor."
Doesn't sound as if the Nazis were too happy with the selection.
In 1928, the Vatican issued a statement declaring that the Church, “just as it reproves all rancours in conflicts between peoples, to the maximum extent condemns hatred of the people once chosen by God, the hatred that commonly goes by the name of anti-Semitism.”
The October 11, 1930 edition of L'Osservatore Romano declared: "Belonging to the Nationalist Socialist Party of Hitler is irreconcilable with the Catholic Conscience." This was reprinted in diocesan newspapers around the world, and especially in Germany.
[Pius XI in 1938] "Mark well that in the Catholic Mass, Abraham is our Patriarch and forefather. Anti-Semitism is incompatible with the lofty thought, which that fact expresses. It is a movement with which we Christians can have nothing to do. No, no, I say to you it is impossible for a Christian to take part in anti-Semitism. It is inadmissible. Through Christ and in Christ we are the spiritual progeny of Abraham. Spiritually, we are all Semites."
Doesn't sound too harsh recently, does it?
Australian Baptist Student
New Member
Dan, Jews were locked in, the walls were patrolled by "Christian" guards, Jews had to get
the written permission of the clergy to leave the walls even for 1 day (to work). Women
would be born in the ghetto and die in it, never leaving its 1 or 2 streets. As noted, they
were places of overcrowding (they were never enlarged, even when the population
increased) and despair. In the Roman one, as noted, they were forbidden by the pope to
have public schools, a hospital, library etc. They were a direct breaking of the
commandment to love your neighbour.
I dont recall mentioning cardinal Parcelli, or of saying he was pro Nazi.
Re the 1928 statement, to flesh out the actual significance of it, it is helpful to go to the
pages of the semi official Civilta Cattolica. It was here that the practical consequences of
Papal policy were seen. Committed to Vatican orthodoxy, it also set the trend for many
other Catholic periodicals, and was held in high esteem by Catholics generally. On May 19, 1928 it
supplied further insight into the thinking behind the Vatican decision. The society had erred, it stated, when they had “covered up not only [the Jews’] defects but also their historic crimes, and attenuated the traditional [Church] language and even that used in the sacred liturgy.” The article further described Jews as being “blinded or hardened in their guilt,” and as being “more exposed to hatred than other people because of their own misdeeds.” They were also the Church’s “most relentless enemies and persecutors.” It expressly noted that only those anti-Semitisms which sprang from a non-Christian base were condemned, and in this context, condemned Liberalism for releasing them from the
ghetto, the church’s chosen way of dealing with them. As a result they were now “bold
and powerful,” and had “an even more preponderant condition of privilege, especially
economic, in modern society.” The article also blamed the Jews for Bolshevism, accused
them of controlling international finance and politics, of unleashing religious persecution
against Catholics and the clergy, and of promoting the separation of church
and state. In discussing a papal condemnation of secular anti-Semitism, it clearly felt an
overwhelming need to reaffirm and restate traditional Catholic Jew hatred. The Vatican
condemnation of anti-Semitism in 1928 was therefore restricted to secular anti-Semitism,
issued in the context of the banning of the Friends of Israel, and accompanied by a
restatement of traditional, religious anti-Semitism. It was also during Pius XI’s tenure
that the Civilta Cattolica wrote that “In its original form, anti-Semitism is nothing but the
absolutely necessary and natural reaction to the Jews’ arrogance ... Catholic anti-Semitism-while never going beyond the limits of moral law-adopts all necessary means to emancipate the Christian people from the abuse they suffer from their sworn
enemy.” It is worth noting again that the Civilta Cattolica described itself as the “Semi-official
organ of the Holy See.” The paper had formal approval from Popes Pius IX and Leo XIII.
Their editorial policy was “always and in all matters to reflect the thinking of the Holy See.” It is described as a “touchstone for Catholic orthodoxy, and an exponent of Vatican
thinking.” Its editor was appointed by the pope, and in the 1920s and 1930s was known to have tight ties with the Secretary of State, Eugenio Parcelli, who would later become Pope Pius XII.
Concerning your next quote, on July 14, 1938, when Pope Pius XI told a group of visiting Belgian Catholics that “We acknowledge everyone’s right to self-defence, to take the means to protest themselves against any threat to their legitimate interests. But anti-Semitism is inadmissible. Spiritually, we are Semites.”
This statement is difficult to assess, both in terms of its content and impact. Concerning their content, the positive conclusion is radically
undermined by the first section. The language of self-defence was precisely the language
used by the church [and the Nazis] to justify the boycotts of Jews in Germany, Poland and elsewhere. As early as 1884, the Anti-Semitic party in Hungary stated in a bill presented to parliament that “anti-Semitism merely means Christian peoples adopting a stance of self-defence against Jewish semitism.” To include such a remark in this context negates much of the usefulness of the sentiment. Concerning its impact, these words appear nowhere in the Vatican’s records, either official or semi-official. The reason is that they were not given in a public address, but in a private conversation to three Belgians. The words are assumed to be sincere, but the Pope, as a lawyer, knew well the Roman axiom: “Quod non est in actis non est in mundo” (“What is not in the records is
not in the world”). They were unofficial, off the record, and reconstructed from second-hand testimony. Had the Pope wished to make a public statement, he was quite capable of doing so.
We return to the same unanswered question. If you were in Rome in the 1850s, and the pope ordered you to put Jews in a ghetto, citing canon law and church councils as back up, would you have obeyed the pope and sinned, or obeyed the commands of God?
Awaiting your reply, Colin
"semi official Civilta Cattolica"
It is a Jesuit paper. Not official or semi-official. Jesuits are one of many orders in the Catholic Church. If you are unfortunate enough you might have read their magazine too.
Some world opinion re Pius XII
[January 1940] ...the Manchester Guardian reported: "Tortured Poland has found a powerful advocate in Rome...[Vatican Radio has warned] all who care for civilization that Europe is in mortal danger."
[ New York Times March 14, 1940] “Pope Is Emphatic About Peace: Jews’ Rights Defended.” “Twice in two days Pope Pius XII has gone out of his way to speak out for justice as well as for peace, and Vatican circles take this as an emphasis of his stern demand to Joachim von Ribbentrop, that Germany right the injustice she has done before there can be peace...It was also learned today for the first time that the Pontiff, in the burning words he spoke to Herr von Ribbentrop about religious persecution, also came to the defense of the Jews.”
As the New York Times editorialized on Christmas Day, 1941, the Pope had placed himself squarely against Hitlerism: "The voice of Pius XII is a lonely voice in the silence and darkness enveloping Europe this Christmas...he is about the only ruler left on the Continent of Europe who dares to raise his voice at all....the Pope put himself squarely against Hitlerism...he left no doubt that the Nazi aims are also irreconcilable with his own conception of a Christian peace."
[January 24, 1942] ...the New York Times reported: "Vatican City radio station made two broadcasts today, adding many details to the atrocities that supposedly are being committed in German-occupied Poland. It is now clear that the papacy is throwing the whole weight of its publicizing facilities into an expose of conditions which, yesterday's broadcast said "profoundly pained" the Pope."
POPE IS SAID TO PLEAD FOR JEWS LISTED FOR REMOVAL FROM FRANCE. This is a headline in the New York Times, August 6, 1942, over a story in which we read that “The church pleas were reportedly made after the Vatican had learned that the Germans asked for a roundup in both zones of German, Austrian, Polish, Czech, Baltic and Jewish refugees who sought safety in France in 1936.”
[The London Times October 11, 1942] “A study of the words which Pope Pius XII had addressed since his accession in encyclicals and allocutions to the Catholics of various nations leaves no room for doubt. He condemns the worship of force and its concrete manifestation in the suppression of national liberties and in the persecution of the Jewish race.”
A [1942] Christmas Day editorial in the New York Times praised Pius XII for his moral leadership: "..This Christmas more than ever he is a lonely voice crying out of the silence of a continent. The Pulpit whence he speaks is more than ever like the Rock on which the Church was founded, a tiny island lashed and surrounded by a sea of war. In these circumstances, in any circumstances, indeed, no once would expect the Pope to speak as a political leader, or a war leader, or in any other role than that of a preacher ordained to stand above the battle, tied impartially, as he says to all people and willing to collaborate in any new order which will bring a just peace. But just because the Pope speaks to and in some sense for all the peoples at war, the clear stand he takes on the fundamental issues of the conflict has greater weight and authority."
[Aug 1943] ...Time magazine reported: “No matter what critics might say, it is scarcely deniable that the Church Apostolic, through the encyclicals and other papal pronouncements, has been fighting totalitarianism more knowingly, devoutly, and authoritatively, and for a longer time, than any other organized power.”
The New York Times reported in 1944: “Under the Pope’s direction the Holy See did an exemplary job of sheltering and championing the victims of the Nazi-Fascist regime.”
The New York Times reported in 1944 that Rome's population grew during Nazi occupation because: "in that period under the Pope's direction the Holy See did an exemplary job of sheltering and championing the victims of the Nazi-Fascist regime. I have spoken to dozens of Italians, both Catholics and Jews, who owe their liberty and perhaps their lives to the protection of the Church. In some cases anti-Fascists were actually saved from execution through the Pope's intervention."
It is a Jesuit paper. Not official or semi-official. Jesuits are one of many orders in the Catholic Church. If you are unfortunate enough you might have read their magazine too.
Some world opinion re Pius XII
[January 1940] ...the Manchester Guardian reported: "Tortured Poland has found a powerful advocate in Rome...[Vatican Radio has warned] all who care for civilization that Europe is in mortal danger."
[ New York Times March 14, 1940] “Pope Is Emphatic About Peace: Jews’ Rights Defended.” “Twice in two days Pope Pius XII has gone out of his way to speak out for justice as well as for peace, and Vatican circles take this as an emphasis of his stern demand to Joachim von Ribbentrop, that Germany right the injustice she has done before there can be peace...It was also learned today for the first time that the Pontiff, in the burning words he spoke to Herr von Ribbentrop about religious persecution, also came to the defense of the Jews.”
As the New York Times editorialized on Christmas Day, 1941, the Pope had placed himself squarely against Hitlerism: "The voice of Pius XII is a lonely voice in the silence and darkness enveloping Europe this Christmas...he is about the only ruler left on the Continent of Europe who dares to raise his voice at all....the Pope put himself squarely against Hitlerism...he left no doubt that the Nazi aims are also irreconcilable with his own conception of a Christian peace."
[January 24, 1942] ...the New York Times reported: "Vatican City radio station made two broadcasts today, adding many details to the atrocities that supposedly are being committed in German-occupied Poland. It is now clear that the papacy is throwing the whole weight of its publicizing facilities into an expose of conditions which, yesterday's broadcast said "profoundly pained" the Pope."
POPE IS SAID TO PLEAD FOR JEWS LISTED FOR REMOVAL FROM FRANCE. This is a headline in the New York Times, August 6, 1942, over a story in which we read that “The church pleas were reportedly made after the Vatican had learned that the Germans asked for a roundup in both zones of German, Austrian, Polish, Czech, Baltic and Jewish refugees who sought safety in France in 1936.”
[The London Times October 11, 1942] “A study of the words which Pope Pius XII had addressed since his accession in encyclicals and allocutions to the Catholics of various nations leaves no room for doubt. He condemns the worship of force and its concrete manifestation in the suppression of national liberties and in the persecution of the Jewish race.”
A [1942] Christmas Day editorial in the New York Times praised Pius XII for his moral leadership: "..This Christmas more than ever he is a lonely voice crying out of the silence of a continent. The Pulpit whence he speaks is more than ever like the Rock on which the Church was founded, a tiny island lashed and surrounded by a sea of war. In these circumstances, in any circumstances, indeed, no once would expect the Pope to speak as a political leader, or a war leader, or in any other role than that of a preacher ordained to stand above the battle, tied impartially, as he says to all people and willing to collaborate in any new order which will bring a just peace. But just because the Pope speaks to and in some sense for all the peoples at war, the clear stand he takes on the fundamental issues of the conflict has greater weight and authority."
[Aug 1943] ...Time magazine reported: “No matter what critics might say, it is scarcely deniable that the Church Apostolic, through the encyclicals and other papal pronouncements, has been fighting totalitarianism more knowingly, devoutly, and authoritatively, and for a longer time, than any other organized power.”
The New York Times reported in 1944: “Under the Pope’s direction the Holy See did an exemplary job of sheltering and championing the victims of the Nazi-Fascist regime.”
The New York Times reported in 1944 that Rome's population grew during Nazi occupation because: "in that period under the Pope's direction the Holy See did an exemplary job of sheltering and championing the victims of the Nazi-Fascist regime. I have spoken to dozens of Italians, both Catholics and Jews, who owe their liberty and perhaps their lives to the protection of the Church. In some cases anti-Fascists were actually saved from execution through the Pope's intervention."
What did others say about the Pope's "silence" during the war?
“When in September 1939, the Germans executed 214 Polish priests, imprisoned another 1000, exiled Cardinal Hlond and a number of bishops, and closed down several churches, ‘the Vatican radio’ Guenter Lewy tells us, ‘told the story to the world.’ But when reprisals for these publications made things progressively worse, ‘Cardinal Sapieha, the Archbishop of Cracow, repeatedly pleaded with the Pope to stop the protesting, as it only made things worse.’” (
Kaul [a priest] states: “Midst tears of joy the Archbishop [Sapieha of Poland] read the Holy Father’s handwriting. Then he broke the seal of the large package given to him by Monsignor Quirino and opened it. I saw that it was a printed encyclical in Polish, the words of Pius XII. The title of the [1942] encyclical: Ideological Differences and Opposition to National Socialism. The Cardinal began to read it. Suddenly he hit his head with his hand, dropped the sheet and exclaimed: ‘For the love of God! It is absolutely impossible for me to share His Holiness’ letter with my clergy, and much less can I communicate it to the people of Poland. It would be sufficient for only one copy to reach the hand of the SD and all our heads would fall. In this case, the Church in Poland would be lost. But doesn’t the Holy Father know the terrible position we are in? This letter must be burned immediately.’ And without thinking further, the entire package was thrown into the fire.”
Writing to Pius XII in 1942, Polish Archbishop (later Cardinal) Sapieha stated: “We much deplore that we cannot communicate Your Holiness’ letters to the faithful, but [they] would provide a pretext for fresh persecution and we already have those who are victims because they were suspected of being in secret communication with the Holy See.
The American charge, Harold H. Tittman, Jr., who had returned after and interview with Pius XII shortly after Christmas, wrote on January 2, 1943: "With regard to his Christmas message, the Pope gave me the impression that he was sincere in believing that he had spoken therein clearly enough to satisfy all those who had been insisting in the past that he utter some word of condemnation of the Nazi atrocities, and he seemed surprised when I told him that I thought there were some who did not share his belief. He said he thought it was plain to everyone that he was referring to the Poles, Jews and hostages when he declared that hundreds of thousands of persons had been killed or tortured through no fault of their own, sometimes only because of their race or nationality. He explained that when talking of atrocities he could not name the Nazis without at the same time mentioning the Bolsheviks and this he thought might not be wholly pleasing to the Allies."
[Re care for orphan refugees]...Cardinal Palazzini stated: "Amidst the clash of arms, a voice could be heard--the voice of Pius XII. The assistance given to so many people could not have been possible without his moral support, which was much more than quiet consent.
Jean Bernard, a priest from Luxembourg, was an inmate of Dachau. He relates in his postwar memoirs: "The detained priests trembled every time news reached us of some protest by a religious authority, but particularly by the Vatican. We all had the impression that our wardens made us atone heavily for the fury these protests evoked."
As one bishop who was imprisoned at Dachau reported: “The detained priests trembled every time news reached us of some protest by religious authority, but particularly the Vatican. We all had the impression that our wardens made us atone heavily for the fury these protests evoked...whenever the way we were treated became more brutal, the Protestant pastors among the prisoners used to vent their indignation on the Catholic priests: ‘Again your big naïve Pope and those simpletons, your bishops, are shooting their mouths off...why don’t they get the idea once and for all, and shut up. They play the heroes and we have to pay the bill.’”
Cardinal Paolo Dezza, SJ, wrote on July 25, 1995: "Pius XII did a great deal to help the Jews persecuted by the Nazis and Fascists. He abstained from making public declarations in favor of both Catholics and Jews who were being persecuted by Hitler because, whenever he did speak, Hitler had his revenge by committing worse acts of violence against them. The clergy and bishops in Germany begged him to keep silence."
"Thousands of Roman Jews would have been captured by the Nazi troops on October 16, 1943, had it not been for the prudent politics of the Vatican," wrote Carlo Sestieri, a well-known Jew who was hidden in one of the Vatican buildings, his wife protected in a nearby convent, He suggested that "perhaps only the Jews who were persecuted understand why the Holy Father, Pope Pius XII, could not publicly denounce the Nazi-Fascist government...Without doubt, it helped avoid worse disasters."
...a German Jewish couple [Wolfsson] whom Pius XII helped escape through Rome to Spain: “None of us wanted the Pope to take an open stand. We were all fugitives, and fugitives do not wish to be pointed at. The Gestapo would have become more excited and would have intensified its inquisitions. If the Pope had protested, Rome would have become the center of attention. It was better that the Pope said nothing. We all shared this opinion at the time and this is still our conviction today.”
Dr. Marcus Melchior, the Chief Rabbi of Denmark, who himself was rescued, together with virtually his entire Jewish community, thanks to silent unpublicized endeavors: “I believe it is an error to think that Pius XII could have any influence whatsoever on the brain of a madman. If the Pope had spoken out, Hitler would have probably massacred more than the six million Jews and perhaps ten times ten million Catholics, if he had the power to do so.”
What would the Germans have done if Pope Pius XII had protested?
Upon learning of calls for resistance [in 1942] that came from these leaders in exile [Poles in London], Splett [Bishop of Danzig] wrote to Pius: " At my inquiry the Gestapo told me that Cardinal Hlond [London] had called for resistance among the Polish population over the Vatican radio station, and the Gestapo had to prevent him... They say that Cardinal Hlond called the Polish people to rally around its priests and teachers. Thereupon, numerous priests and teachers were arrested and executed, or were tortured to death in the most terrible manner, or were even shipped to the far east."
...Monsignor Nowowiejsky, one of the six bishops who spent the war in a German concentration camp, “If the Pope could do nothing against the Nazi criminals who habitually broke their promises and ignored every diplomatic obligation; if he failed to save his own priests form death, what would Hitler have conceded to him on behalf of others?”
Ernst won Weizsacker, Germany’s Chief Secretary of Foreign Affairs until 1943 and then Ambassador to the Holy See, testified [in 1961]: “It was well known--everybody knew it--that the Jewish question was a sore point as far as Hitler was concerned. To speak of interventions and requests submitted from abroad, requests for moderation of the course taken, the results of these, almost in all cases, caused the measures to be made more aggravated, and more serious even, in effect.”
Albrecht von Kessel, aide to Ernst von Weizsacker in the Roman embassy, also testified [in 1961]: “I am convinced, therefore, that His Holiness the Pope did, day and night, think of a manner in which he could help the unfortunate Jews in Rome. If he did not lodge a protest, then it was not done because he thought, justifiably, that if he protested, Hitler would go crazy, and that would not help the Jews at all, that would give one the justified fear that they would be killed even more quickly. Apart from that, the SS would probably have been instructed to penetrate into the Vatican and lay hands on the Pope.”
“The Church did not submit to Germany,” wrote Paolo Vincentin in an article that appeared in L’Osservatore Romano in 1965. “We who were members of the German Embassy, although we judged the situation differently, were in complete accord on one point: a solemn protest by Pius XII against the persecution of the Jews probably would have exposed him and the Roman Curia to great danger and certainly then, in the autumn of 1943, he would not have been able to save the life of a single Jew.”
Weizsacker [German Ambassador to the Vatican] later explained: "Any protest by the Pope would result in the deportations being really carried out in the thoroughgoing fashion. I know how our people react in these matters."
At the Nuremberg trials, German Field Marshal Albert Kesselring testified: “If [Pius XII] did not protest, he failed to do so because he told himself, quite rightly: If I protest, Hitler will be driven to madness; not only will that not help the Jews, but we must expect that they will then be killed all the more.’”
Ernst von Weizsacker, German ambassador to the Vatican during the war...: “A ‘flaming protest’ by the Pope would not only have been unsuccessful in halting the machinery of destruction but might have caused a great deal of additional damage--to the thousands of Jews hidden in the Vatican and the monasteries, to the Mischlinge, the Church, the territorial integrity of the Vatican City, and--last but not least--to the Catholics in all of Germany-occupied Europe.”
“When in September 1939, the Germans executed 214 Polish priests, imprisoned another 1000, exiled Cardinal Hlond and a number of bishops, and closed down several churches, ‘the Vatican radio’ Guenter Lewy tells us, ‘told the story to the world.’ But when reprisals for these publications made things progressively worse, ‘Cardinal Sapieha, the Archbishop of Cracow, repeatedly pleaded with the Pope to stop the protesting, as it only made things worse.’” (
Kaul [a priest] states: “Midst tears of joy the Archbishop [Sapieha of Poland] read the Holy Father’s handwriting. Then he broke the seal of the large package given to him by Monsignor Quirino and opened it. I saw that it was a printed encyclical in Polish, the words of Pius XII. The title of the [1942] encyclical: Ideological Differences and Opposition to National Socialism. The Cardinal began to read it. Suddenly he hit his head with his hand, dropped the sheet and exclaimed: ‘For the love of God! It is absolutely impossible for me to share His Holiness’ letter with my clergy, and much less can I communicate it to the people of Poland. It would be sufficient for only one copy to reach the hand of the SD and all our heads would fall. In this case, the Church in Poland would be lost. But doesn’t the Holy Father know the terrible position we are in? This letter must be burned immediately.’ And without thinking further, the entire package was thrown into the fire.”
Writing to Pius XII in 1942, Polish Archbishop (later Cardinal) Sapieha stated: “We much deplore that we cannot communicate Your Holiness’ letters to the faithful, but [they] would provide a pretext for fresh persecution and we already have those who are victims because they were suspected of being in secret communication with the Holy See.
The American charge, Harold H. Tittman, Jr., who had returned after and interview with Pius XII shortly after Christmas, wrote on January 2, 1943: "With regard to his Christmas message, the Pope gave me the impression that he was sincere in believing that he had spoken therein clearly enough to satisfy all those who had been insisting in the past that he utter some word of condemnation of the Nazi atrocities, and he seemed surprised when I told him that I thought there were some who did not share his belief. He said he thought it was plain to everyone that he was referring to the Poles, Jews and hostages when he declared that hundreds of thousands of persons had been killed or tortured through no fault of their own, sometimes only because of their race or nationality. He explained that when talking of atrocities he could not name the Nazis without at the same time mentioning the Bolsheviks and this he thought might not be wholly pleasing to the Allies."
[Re care for orphan refugees]...Cardinal Palazzini stated: "Amidst the clash of arms, a voice could be heard--the voice of Pius XII. The assistance given to so many people could not have been possible without his moral support, which was much more than quiet consent.
Jean Bernard, a priest from Luxembourg, was an inmate of Dachau. He relates in his postwar memoirs: "The detained priests trembled every time news reached us of some protest by a religious authority, but particularly by the Vatican. We all had the impression that our wardens made us atone heavily for the fury these protests evoked."
As one bishop who was imprisoned at Dachau reported: “The detained priests trembled every time news reached us of some protest by religious authority, but particularly the Vatican. We all had the impression that our wardens made us atone heavily for the fury these protests evoked...whenever the way we were treated became more brutal, the Protestant pastors among the prisoners used to vent their indignation on the Catholic priests: ‘Again your big naïve Pope and those simpletons, your bishops, are shooting their mouths off...why don’t they get the idea once and for all, and shut up. They play the heroes and we have to pay the bill.’”
Cardinal Paolo Dezza, SJ, wrote on July 25, 1995: "Pius XII did a great deal to help the Jews persecuted by the Nazis and Fascists. He abstained from making public declarations in favor of both Catholics and Jews who were being persecuted by Hitler because, whenever he did speak, Hitler had his revenge by committing worse acts of violence against them. The clergy and bishops in Germany begged him to keep silence."
"Thousands of Roman Jews would have been captured by the Nazi troops on October 16, 1943, had it not been for the prudent politics of the Vatican," wrote Carlo Sestieri, a well-known Jew who was hidden in one of the Vatican buildings, his wife protected in a nearby convent, He suggested that "perhaps only the Jews who were persecuted understand why the Holy Father, Pope Pius XII, could not publicly denounce the Nazi-Fascist government...Without doubt, it helped avoid worse disasters."
...a German Jewish couple [Wolfsson] whom Pius XII helped escape through Rome to Spain: “None of us wanted the Pope to take an open stand. We were all fugitives, and fugitives do not wish to be pointed at. The Gestapo would have become more excited and would have intensified its inquisitions. If the Pope had protested, Rome would have become the center of attention. It was better that the Pope said nothing. We all shared this opinion at the time and this is still our conviction today.”
Dr. Marcus Melchior, the Chief Rabbi of Denmark, who himself was rescued, together with virtually his entire Jewish community, thanks to silent unpublicized endeavors: “I believe it is an error to think that Pius XII could have any influence whatsoever on the brain of a madman. If the Pope had spoken out, Hitler would have probably massacred more than the six million Jews and perhaps ten times ten million Catholics, if he had the power to do so.”
What would the Germans have done if Pope Pius XII had protested?
Upon learning of calls for resistance [in 1942] that came from these leaders in exile [Poles in London], Splett [Bishop of Danzig] wrote to Pius: " At my inquiry the Gestapo told me that Cardinal Hlond [London] had called for resistance among the Polish population over the Vatican radio station, and the Gestapo had to prevent him... They say that Cardinal Hlond called the Polish people to rally around its priests and teachers. Thereupon, numerous priests and teachers were arrested and executed, or were tortured to death in the most terrible manner, or were even shipped to the far east."
...Monsignor Nowowiejsky, one of the six bishops who spent the war in a German concentration camp, “If the Pope could do nothing against the Nazi criminals who habitually broke their promises and ignored every diplomatic obligation; if he failed to save his own priests form death, what would Hitler have conceded to him on behalf of others?”
Ernst won Weizsacker, Germany’s Chief Secretary of Foreign Affairs until 1943 and then Ambassador to the Holy See, testified [in 1961]: “It was well known--everybody knew it--that the Jewish question was a sore point as far as Hitler was concerned. To speak of interventions and requests submitted from abroad, requests for moderation of the course taken, the results of these, almost in all cases, caused the measures to be made more aggravated, and more serious even, in effect.”
Albrecht von Kessel, aide to Ernst von Weizsacker in the Roman embassy, also testified [in 1961]: “I am convinced, therefore, that His Holiness the Pope did, day and night, think of a manner in which he could help the unfortunate Jews in Rome. If he did not lodge a protest, then it was not done because he thought, justifiably, that if he protested, Hitler would go crazy, and that would not help the Jews at all, that would give one the justified fear that they would be killed even more quickly. Apart from that, the SS would probably have been instructed to penetrate into the Vatican and lay hands on the Pope.”
“The Church did not submit to Germany,” wrote Paolo Vincentin in an article that appeared in L’Osservatore Romano in 1965. “We who were members of the German Embassy, although we judged the situation differently, were in complete accord on one point: a solemn protest by Pius XII against the persecution of the Jews probably would have exposed him and the Roman Curia to great danger and certainly then, in the autumn of 1943, he would not have been able to save the life of a single Jew.”
Weizsacker [German Ambassador to the Vatican] later explained: "Any protest by the Pope would result in the deportations being really carried out in the thoroughgoing fashion. I know how our people react in these matters."
At the Nuremberg trials, German Field Marshal Albert Kesselring testified: “If [Pius XII] did not protest, he failed to do so because he told himself, quite rightly: If I protest, Hitler will be driven to madness; not only will that not help the Jews, but we must expect that they will then be killed all the more.’”
Ernst von Weizsacker, German ambassador to the Vatican during the war...: “A ‘flaming protest’ by the Pope would not only have been unsuccessful in halting the machinery of destruction but might have caused a great deal of additional damage--to the thousands of Jews hidden in the Vatican and the monasteries, to the Mischlinge, the Church, the territorial integrity of the Vatican City, and--last but not least--to the Catholics in all of Germany-occupied Europe.”
What did the Jews say about the Church during the war?
With the issuance of Pius XII’s first encyclical, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in New York (October 27, 1939) reported that the “unqualified condemnation which Pope Pius XII heaped on totalitarian, racist and materialistic theories of government in his encyclical, Summi Pontificatus, caused a profound stir....few observers had expected so outspoken a document.”
On January 26, 1940, the Jewish Advocate in Boston reported: “The Vatican radio this week broadcast an outspoken denunciation of German atrocities in Nazi [occupied] Poland, declaring they affronted the moral conscience of mankind.”
Joseph L. Lichten, a Jewish Rabbi, wrote: “It is known that in 1940 Pius XII sent out a secret instruction to the Catholic bishops of Europe entitled Opere et caritate (By work and Love). The letter began with a quotation from Pope Pius XI’s encyclical Mit Brennender Sorge, and ordered that all people suffering from racial discrimination at the hands of the Nazis be given help. The letter was to be read in churches with the comment that racism was incompatible with the teachings of the Catholic faith.”
[December 23, 1940 Albert Einstein in Time magazine] “Being a lover of freedom, when the Nazi revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but, no, the universities immediately were silenced. Then I looked to the great editors of the newspapers, whose flaming editorials in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom; but they like the universities, were silenced in a few short weeks....Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing the truth. I never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I feel a great affection and admiration because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to stand for intellectual truth and moral freedom. I am forced thus to confess what I once despised, I now praise unreservedly.”
On September 4, 1942, the Canadian Jewish Chronicle, referring to Vichy leader Pierre Laval, ran this headline: “Laval Spurns Pope: 25,000 Jews in France Arrested for Deportation.”
London’s Jewish Chronicle wrote editorially on September 11, 1942: “A word of sincere and earnest appreciation is due from the Jews to the Vatican for its intervention in Berlin and Vichy on behalf of their tortured co-religionists in France...It was a step urged, to their honor, by a number of Catholics, but for which we may be sure, the Holy Father himself, with his intense humanity and his clear sighted understanding of the true and deadly implications of the assaults on the Jewish people, needed no prompting.”
On October 29, 1943, the Jewish Chronicle of London recorded the well-publicized protest Pius XII had launched against the Nazi roundup of Roman Jews: “The Vatican has made strong representations to the German government and the German high command in Italy against the persecutions of Jews in Nazi-occupied Italy.”
The American Jewish Press noted: "Pope Pius XII has been moving cautiously for this is a time of war--when heads of religions and states must act with calm and consideration," but now he was taking actions that were "obviously a rebuke to Italian anti-Semitism."
[Chief Rabbi of Rome Zolli regarding the hiding of Roman Jews in 1943] “The Holy Father sent a letter by hand to the bishops instructing them to lift the enclosure from convents and monasteries, so that they could become refuges for the Jews. I know of one convent where the Sisters slept in the basement, giving up their beds to Jewish refugees.”
The Jewish Chronicle (London) reported that “Catholic priests have taken a leading part in hiding hunted Jews, and sheltering the children of those who are under arrest or have been deported to Germany.”
On August 2, 1943, the World Jewish Congress sent the following message to Pope Pius: "World Jewish Congress respectfully expresses gratitude to Your Holiness for your gracious concern for innocent peoples afflicted by the calamities of war and appeals to Your Holiness to use your high authority by suggesting Italian authorities may remove as speedily possible to Southern Italy or other safer areas twenty thousand Jewish refugees and Italian nationals now concentrated in internment camps...and so prevent their deportation and similar tragic fate which has befallen Jews in Eastern Europe. Our terror-stricken brethren look to Your Holiness as the only hope for saving them from persecution and death."
In November [1943], Rabbi Isaac Herzog again wrote to Pius expressing "his sincere gratitude and deep appreciation for so kind an attitude toward Israel and for such valuable assistance given by the Catholic Church to the endangered Jewish people."
According to the 1943-1944 American Jewish Yearbook, Pius XII “took an unequivocal stand against the oppression of Jews throughout Europe.”
Chief Rabbi Alexander Safran, of Bucharet, Rumania, made the following statement on April 7, 1944, to Monsignor Andrea Cassulo, Papal Nuncio to Rumania: “In the most difficult hours which we Jews of Rumania have passed through, the generous assistance of the Holy See was decisive and salutary. It is not easy for us to find the right words to express the warmth and consolation we experience because of the concern of the Supreme Pontiff who offered a large sum to relieve the sufferings of deported Jews--sufferings which had been pointed out to him by you after your visit to Transnystria. The Jews of Rumania will never forget these facts of historical importance.”
On June 22, 1944, Rabbi Andre Zaoui wrote to Pius to thank him for saving so many Jewish people: "What a magnificent manifestation of fraternity, so great in its intimate simplicity. Israel will not forget you. Side by side you continue to accomplish your mission, practicing and teaching the law of love of God and neighbor."
Representing the World Jewish Congress, Rabbi Maurice Perlzweig wrote that “the repeated interventions of the Holy Father on behalf of Jewish Communities in Europe has evoked the profoundest sentiments of appreciation and gratitude from Jews throughout the world.”
When the Allies entered Rome on June 4, 1944, the Jewish News Bulletin of the British Eighth Army printed the following: “To the everlasting credit of the people of Rome, and the Roman Catholic Church, the lot of the Jews has been made easier by their truly Christian offers of assistance and shelter. Even now, many still remain in places which opened their doors to hide them from the fate of deportation to certain death. The full story of the help given to our people by the Church cannot be told for obvious reasons, until after the war.”
[Rabbi Zolli of Rome, hidden in the Vatican on July 14th, 1944] “The Vatican has always helped the Jews and the Jews are very grateful for the charitable work of the Vatican, all done without distinction of race.”
Davar, the Hebrew daily of Israel's Federation of Labor, quoted a Jewish Brigade officer shortly after Rome's liberation: "When we entered Rome, the Jewish survivors told us with a voice filled with deep gratitude and respect: 'If we have been rescued; if Jews are still alive in Rome come with us and than the pope in the Vatican. For in the Vatican proper, in churches, monasteries and private homes, Jews were kept hidden at his personal orders.'"
...the President of the American Jewish Committee, Judge Joseph Proshauer, declared in his speech at a rally in Manhattan’s Madison Square Park on July 31st [1944]: “We have heard...what a great part the Holy Father has played in the salvation of the refugees in Italy, and we know from sources that must be credited that this great Pope has reached forth his mighty and sheltering hand to help the oppressed of Hungary.”
The California Jewish Voice, called Pius "a spiritual ally" because he "linked his name with the multitude who are horrified by the Axis inhumanity."
The Jewish Chronicle (London) said that the Vatican was due a "word of sincere and earnest appreciation" from Jews for its intervention in Berlin and Vichy.
That same month [September 1944], the Jewish Chronicle (London) editorialized that "The Pope's action is...a striking affirmation of the dictum of one of the Pope's predecessors that no true Christian can be an anti-Semite."
Chief Rabbi Herzog, in his minutes of the meeting he had with Monsignor Hughes on September 5, 1944, confirms: “To our knowledge the Church is hiding Jews in Slovakia.”
On September 27 1944, some three weeks after the liberation of Romania, the Chief Rabbi said in an interview with the Bucharest daily Mantuirea: “For two long years, when the deportations of Romanian Jewry were already decided and about to be carried out, the high moral authority of the Nuncio saved us...he prevailed so that the deportations should not take place...It was he who obtained the repatriation of all the Jews from Transnystria, but for the Jewish orphans in particular he was a loving father. With that deep satisfaction did he inform me that they might leave for the Holy Land.”
On October 29, 1944, elder survivors from a concentration camp in Ferramonti, Italy presented Pius a letter which said, in part: “Now that the victorious Allied troops have broken our chains and liberated us from captivity and danger, may we, the Jewish internees of Ferramonti, be permitted to express our deepest and devoted thanks for the comfort and help which your Holiness deigned to grant us with fatherly concern and infinite kindness throughout our years of internment and persecution. Your Holiness has as the first and highest authority upon earth fearlessly raised his universally respected voice, in the face of our powerful enemies, in order to defend openly our rights of the dignity of man....When we were threatened with deportation to Poland, in 1942, Your Holiness extended his fatherly hand to protect us, and stopped the transfer of the Jews interned in Italy, thereby saving us from almost certain death. With deep confidence and hope that the work of Your Holiness may be crowned with further success, we beg to express our heartfelt thanks while we pray to the Almighty: May Your Holiness reign for many years on this Holy See and exert your beneficent influence over the destiny of the nations.”
Chief Rabbi Herzog [Palestine] wrote [in 1944]: "The people of Israel will never forget what his Holiness and his illustrious delegates inspired by the eternal principles of religion which form the very foundations of true civilization, are doing for us unfortunate brothers and sister in the most tragic hour or our history, which is living proof of divine Providence in this world."
On January 1, 1945, Joseph Hertz, the Grand Rabbi of the British Empire, wrote to Msgr. William Godrey, Papal Nuncio in the United Kingdom as follows: “All the deeper is our appreciation of the sympathy that His Holiness the Pope, and all those associated in the leadership of the Vatican, have shown in the fate of our doomed brethren. The whole House of Israel will be ever mindful of the many and persistent efforts that have been made by Roman Catholic authorities to rescue Jews threatened with barbarous murder.”
With the issuance of Pius XII’s first encyclical, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in New York (October 27, 1939) reported that the “unqualified condemnation which Pope Pius XII heaped on totalitarian, racist and materialistic theories of government in his encyclical, Summi Pontificatus, caused a profound stir....few observers had expected so outspoken a document.”
On January 26, 1940, the Jewish Advocate in Boston reported: “The Vatican radio this week broadcast an outspoken denunciation of German atrocities in Nazi [occupied] Poland, declaring they affronted the moral conscience of mankind.”
Joseph L. Lichten, a Jewish Rabbi, wrote: “It is known that in 1940 Pius XII sent out a secret instruction to the Catholic bishops of Europe entitled Opere et caritate (By work and Love). The letter began with a quotation from Pope Pius XI’s encyclical Mit Brennender Sorge, and ordered that all people suffering from racial discrimination at the hands of the Nazis be given help. The letter was to be read in churches with the comment that racism was incompatible with the teachings of the Catholic faith.”
[December 23, 1940 Albert Einstein in Time magazine] “Being a lover of freedom, when the Nazi revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but, no, the universities immediately were silenced. Then I looked to the great editors of the newspapers, whose flaming editorials in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom; but they like the universities, were silenced in a few short weeks....Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing the truth. I never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I feel a great affection and admiration because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to stand for intellectual truth and moral freedom. I am forced thus to confess what I once despised, I now praise unreservedly.”
On September 4, 1942, the Canadian Jewish Chronicle, referring to Vichy leader Pierre Laval, ran this headline: “Laval Spurns Pope: 25,000 Jews in France Arrested for Deportation.”
London’s Jewish Chronicle wrote editorially on September 11, 1942: “A word of sincere and earnest appreciation is due from the Jews to the Vatican for its intervention in Berlin and Vichy on behalf of their tortured co-religionists in France...It was a step urged, to their honor, by a number of Catholics, but for which we may be sure, the Holy Father himself, with his intense humanity and his clear sighted understanding of the true and deadly implications of the assaults on the Jewish people, needed no prompting.”
On October 29, 1943, the Jewish Chronicle of London recorded the well-publicized protest Pius XII had launched against the Nazi roundup of Roman Jews: “The Vatican has made strong representations to the German government and the German high command in Italy against the persecutions of Jews in Nazi-occupied Italy.”
The American Jewish Press noted: "Pope Pius XII has been moving cautiously for this is a time of war--when heads of religions and states must act with calm and consideration," but now he was taking actions that were "obviously a rebuke to Italian anti-Semitism."
[Chief Rabbi of Rome Zolli regarding the hiding of Roman Jews in 1943] “The Holy Father sent a letter by hand to the bishops instructing them to lift the enclosure from convents and monasteries, so that they could become refuges for the Jews. I know of one convent where the Sisters slept in the basement, giving up their beds to Jewish refugees.”
The Jewish Chronicle (London) reported that “Catholic priests have taken a leading part in hiding hunted Jews, and sheltering the children of those who are under arrest or have been deported to Germany.”
On August 2, 1943, the World Jewish Congress sent the following message to Pope Pius: "World Jewish Congress respectfully expresses gratitude to Your Holiness for your gracious concern for innocent peoples afflicted by the calamities of war and appeals to Your Holiness to use your high authority by suggesting Italian authorities may remove as speedily possible to Southern Italy or other safer areas twenty thousand Jewish refugees and Italian nationals now concentrated in internment camps...and so prevent their deportation and similar tragic fate which has befallen Jews in Eastern Europe. Our terror-stricken brethren look to Your Holiness as the only hope for saving them from persecution and death."
In November [1943], Rabbi Isaac Herzog again wrote to Pius expressing "his sincere gratitude and deep appreciation for so kind an attitude toward Israel and for such valuable assistance given by the Catholic Church to the endangered Jewish people."
According to the 1943-1944 American Jewish Yearbook, Pius XII “took an unequivocal stand against the oppression of Jews throughout Europe.”
Chief Rabbi Alexander Safran, of Bucharet, Rumania, made the following statement on April 7, 1944, to Monsignor Andrea Cassulo, Papal Nuncio to Rumania: “In the most difficult hours which we Jews of Rumania have passed through, the generous assistance of the Holy See was decisive and salutary. It is not easy for us to find the right words to express the warmth and consolation we experience because of the concern of the Supreme Pontiff who offered a large sum to relieve the sufferings of deported Jews--sufferings which had been pointed out to him by you after your visit to Transnystria. The Jews of Rumania will never forget these facts of historical importance.”
On June 22, 1944, Rabbi Andre Zaoui wrote to Pius to thank him for saving so many Jewish people: "What a magnificent manifestation of fraternity, so great in its intimate simplicity. Israel will not forget you. Side by side you continue to accomplish your mission, practicing and teaching the law of love of God and neighbor."
Representing the World Jewish Congress, Rabbi Maurice Perlzweig wrote that “the repeated interventions of the Holy Father on behalf of Jewish Communities in Europe has evoked the profoundest sentiments of appreciation and gratitude from Jews throughout the world.”
When the Allies entered Rome on June 4, 1944, the Jewish News Bulletin of the British Eighth Army printed the following: “To the everlasting credit of the people of Rome, and the Roman Catholic Church, the lot of the Jews has been made easier by their truly Christian offers of assistance and shelter. Even now, many still remain in places which opened their doors to hide them from the fate of deportation to certain death. The full story of the help given to our people by the Church cannot be told for obvious reasons, until after the war.”
[Rabbi Zolli of Rome, hidden in the Vatican on July 14th, 1944] “The Vatican has always helped the Jews and the Jews are very grateful for the charitable work of the Vatican, all done without distinction of race.”
Davar, the Hebrew daily of Israel's Federation of Labor, quoted a Jewish Brigade officer shortly after Rome's liberation: "When we entered Rome, the Jewish survivors told us with a voice filled with deep gratitude and respect: 'If we have been rescued; if Jews are still alive in Rome come with us and than the pope in the Vatican. For in the Vatican proper, in churches, monasteries and private homes, Jews were kept hidden at his personal orders.'"
...the President of the American Jewish Committee, Judge Joseph Proshauer, declared in his speech at a rally in Manhattan’s Madison Square Park on July 31st [1944]: “We have heard...what a great part the Holy Father has played in the salvation of the refugees in Italy, and we know from sources that must be credited that this great Pope has reached forth his mighty and sheltering hand to help the oppressed of Hungary.”
The California Jewish Voice, called Pius "a spiritual ally" because he "linked his name with the multitude who are horrified by the Axis inhumanity."
The Jewish Chronicle (London) said that the Vatican was due a "word of sincere and earnest appreciation" from Jews for its intervention in Berlin and Vichy.
That same month [September 1944], the Jewish Chronicle (London) editorialized that "The Pope's action is...a striking affirmation of the dictum of one of the Pope's predecessors that no true Christian can be an anti-Semite."
Chief Rabbi Herzog, in his minutes of the meeting he had with Monsignor Hughes on September 5, 1944, confirms: “To our knowledge the Church is hiding Jews in Slovakia.”
On September 27 1944, some three weeks after the liberation of Romania, the Chief Rabbi said in an interview with the Bucharest daily Mantuirea: “For two long years, when the deportations of Romanian Jewry were already decided and about to be carried out, the high moral authority of the Nuncio saved us...he prevailed so that the deportations should not take place...It was he who obtained the repatriation of all the Jews from Transnystria, but for the Jewish orphans in particular he was a loving father. With that deep satisfaction did he inform me that they might leave for the Holy Land.”
On October 29, 1944, elder survivors from a concentration camp in Ferramonti, Italy presented Pius a letter which said, in part: “Now that the victorious Allied troops have broken our chains and liberated us from captivity and danger, may we, the Jewish internees of Ferramonti, be permitted to express our deepest and devoted thanks for the comfort and help which your Holiness deigned to grant us with fatherly concern and infinite kindness throughout our years of internment and persecution. Your Holiness has as the first and highest authority upon earth fearlessly raised his universally respected voice, in the face of our powerful enemies, in order to defend openly our rights of the dignity of man....When we were threatened with deportation to Poland, in 1942, Your Holiness extended his fatherly hand to protect us, and stopped the transfer of the Jews interned in Italy, thereby saving us from almost certain death. With deep confidence and hope that the work of Your Holiness may be crowned with further success, we beg to express our heartfelt thanks while we pray to the Almighty: May Your Holiness reign for many years on this Holy See and exert your beneficent influence over the destiny of the nations.”
Chief Rabbi Herzog [Palestine] wrote [in 1944]: "The people of Israel will never forget what his Holiness and his illustrious delegates inspired by the eternal principles of religion which form the very foundations of true civilization, are doing for us unfortunate brothers and sister in the most tragic hour or our history, which is living proof of divine Providence in this world."
On January 1, 1945, Joseph Hertz, the Grand Rabbi of the British Empire, wrote to Msgr. William Godrey, Papal Nuncio in the United Kingdom as follows: “All the deeper is our appreciation of the sympathy that His Holiness the Pope, and all those associated in the leadership of the Vatican, have shown in the fate of our doomed brethren. The whole House of Israel will be ever mindful of the many and persistent efforts that have been made by Roman Catholic authorities to rescue Jews threatened with barbarous murder.”
[Pius XI in 1938] "Mark well that in the Catholic Mass, Abraham is our Patriarch and forefather. Anti-Semitism is incompatible with the lofty thought, which that fact expresses. It is a movement with which we Christians can have nothing to do. No, no, I say to you it is impossible for a Christian to take part in anti-Semitism. It is inadmissible. Through Christ and in Christ we are the spiritual progeny of Abraham. Spiritually, we are all Semites."
I didn't see anything about self-defense or Belgian waffles either.
I didn't see anything about self-defense or Belgian waffles either.
thessalonian
New Member
Dan,
I really enjoyed your posts. Your research is OUTSTANDING. Even better than Lisa's.
I really enjoyed your posts. Your research is OUTSTANDING. Even better than Lisa's.
--ThessalonianI really enjoyed your posts. --
Here are a few more--
What did Cardinal Pacelli say about the Jews and Nazis?
...Pacelli helped prepare a decree condemning anti-Semitism, issued March 25, 1928: “Moved by Christian charity, the Holy See is obligated to protect the Jewish people against unjust vexations and, just as it reprobates all rancor and conflicts between peoples, it particularly condemns unreservedly hatred against the people once chose by God, the hatred that commonly goes by the name of anti-Semitism.”
At a party in [in 1933] Rome, one of Pacelli's old friends said that it was good that Germany now had a strong leader to deal with the Communists. Pacelli responded: "Don’t talk such nonsense. The Nazis are infinitely worse."
In a private conversation with Ivone Kirkpatrick, British Ambassador to the Vatican, Pacelli denied that the treaty constituted an approval of Nazism. In fact, he expressed “disgust and abhorrence” of Hitler’s reign of terror. “I had to choose between an agreement on their lines,” he said on August 11, 1933, “and the virtual elimination of the Catholic Church in the Reich.”
The British Charge d'Affaires at the Holy See, Ivone Kirkpatrick, in a letter to Sir Robert Vansittart, dated August 19, 1933, explained an encounter he had with Pacelli at this time:
"Cardinal Pacelli...deplored the action of the German Government at home, their persecution of Jews, their proceedings against political opponents, the reign of terror to which the whole nation was subjected. I said to his Eminence that I had heard the opinion expressed in Italy and elsewhere that these events (persecution of Jews, etc.) were but manifestations of the revolutionary spirit. With the passage of time and the responsibilities of office, Herr Hitler would settle down, temper the zeal of his supporters and revert to more normal methods of government. The Cardinal replied with emphasis that he saw no ground for such easy optimism. It seemed to him that there was no indication of any modification in the internal policy of the German government."
The French Ambassador at the Vatican, Francois Charles-Roux, believed that neither Pacelli nor the Pope were under any illusions about Hitler’s word, but, as Pacelli stated to him, “I do not regret our concordat with Germany. If we did not have it, we would not have a foundation on which to base our protests.” In any event, as Pacelli joked to a British diplomat, the National Socialists “would probably not violate all of the articles of the concordat at the same time.”
[Pacelli] He referred [in 1933] to Nazis as “false prophets with the pride of Lucifer,” and “bearers of a new faith and a new gospel.”
[From Mit Brennender Sorge, an encyclical drafted by Cardinal Pacelli and issued by Pope Pius XI. Written in German for wider dissemination and smuggled into Germany in March 1937] "Whoever exalts race, or the people, or the State, or a particular form of State, or the depositories of power, or any other fundamental value of the human community--however necessary and honorable be their function in worldly things--whoever raises these notions above their standard value and divinizes them to an idolatrous level, distorts and perverts an order of the world planned and created by God; he is far from the true faith in God and from the concept of life which that faith upholds."
...in a speech at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, he [Pacelli in 1937] spoke of "that noble and powerful nation whom bad shepherds would lead astray indo an idolatry of race." He struck out against the "iniquitous violence" and the "vile criminal actions" being perpetrated by German leaders, and he denounced the "pagan cult of race." The Nazis knew what he meant. The Reich and Prussian Minister for Ecclesiastical Affairs wrote to the German Foreign Ministry that Pacelli's "unmistakable allusion to Germany...was very well understood in the France Popular Front and the anti-German world."
What did the Nazis say about the Church prior to the war?
Herman Goering, a German World War I flying hero, was an early follower of Hitler. He was now Prussian Minister of the Interior, and in that role he made a filmed statement in which he said, “I shall sweep clean and remove from office all those Communists and Catholics who are opposing are national endeavors.”
[re Concordat] Hitler, who never intended to keep his promises, was happy to accept all of the Church’s long-standing demands. (“I will be one of the few men in history who have deceived the Vatican,” he boasted shortly after signing the concordat.)
Hermann Goering complained [in mid-1930s] that: “Catholic believers carry away one impression from attendance at divine services and that is that the Catholic Church rejects the institutions of the Nationalist State. How could it be otherwise when they are continuously engaging in polemics on political questions or events in their sermons....hardly a Sunday passes but that they abuse the so-called religious atmosphere of divine service in order to read pastoral letters on purely political subjects.” Adolf Wagner, Bavarian Minister of the Interior, said “there will be no peace in Germany until all the political priests are driven out and exterminated”
Das Schwarze Korps called it [Mit Brennender Sorge] "the most incredible of Pius XI's pastoral letters; every sentence in it was an insult to the new Germany."
In May [1937], Hitler was quoted in a Swiss newspaper as saying, "the Third Reich does not desire a modus vivendi with the Catholic Church, but rather its destruction with lies and dishonor, in order to make room for a German Church in which the German race will be glorified."
Here are a few more--
What did Cardinal Pacelli say about the Jews and Nazis?
...Pacelli helped prepare a decree condemning anti-Semitism, issued March 25, 1928: “Moved by Christian charity, the Holy See is obligated to protect the Jewish people against unjust vexations and, just as it reprobates all rancor and conflicts between peoples, it particularly condemns unreservedly hatred against the people once chose by God, the hatred that commonly goes by the name of anti-Semitism.”
At a party in [in 1933] Rome, one of Pacelli's old friends said that it was good that Germany now had a strong leader to deal with the Communists. Pacelli responded: "Don’t talk such nonsense. The Nazis are infinitely worse."
In a private conversation with Ivone Kirkpatrick, British Ambassador to the Vatican, Pacelli denied that the treaty constituted an approval of Nazism. In fact, he expressed “disgust and abhorrence” of Hitler’s reign of terror. “I had to choose between an agreement on their lines,” he said on August 11, 1933, “and the virtual elimination of the Catholic Church in the Reich.”
The British Charge d'Affaires at the Holy See, Ivone Kirkpatrick, in a letter to Sir Robert Vansittart, dated August 19, 1933, explained an encounter he had with Pacelli at this time:
"Cardinal Pacelli...deplored the action of the German Government at home, their persecution of Jews, their proceedings against political opponents, the reign of terror to which the whole nation was subjected. I said to his Eminence that I had heard the opinion expressed in Italy and elsewhere that these events (persecution of Jews, etc.) were but manifestations of the revolutionary spirit. With the passage of time and the responsibilities of office, Herr Hitler would settle down, temper the zeal of his supporters and revert to more normal methods of government. The Cardinal replied with emphasis that he saw no ground for such easy optimism. It seemed to him that there was no indication of any modification in the internal policy of the German government."
The French Ambassador at the Vatican, Francois Charles-Roux, believed that neither Pacelli nor the Pope were under any illusions about Hitler’s word, but, as Pacelli stated to him, “I do not regret our concordat with Germany. If we did not have it, we would not have a foundation on which to base our protests.” In any event, as Pacelli joked to a British diplomat, the National Socialists “would probably not violate all of the articles of the concordat at the same time.”
[Pacelli] He referred [in 1933] to Nazis as “false prophets with the pride of Lucifer,” and “bearers of a new faith and a new gospel.”
[From Mit Brennender Sorge, an encyclical drafted by Cardinal Pacelli and issued by Pope Pius XI. Written in German for wider dissemination and smuggled into Germany in March 1937] "Whoever exalts race, or the people, or the State, or a particular form of State, or the depositories of power, or any other fundamental value of the human community--however necessary and honorable be their function in worldly things--whoever raises these notions above their standard value and divinizes them to an idolatrous level, distorts and perverts an order of the world planned and created by God; he is far from the true faith in God and from the concept of life which that faith upholds."
...in a speech at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, he [Pacelli in 1937] spoke of "that noble and powerful nation whom bad shepherds would lead astray indo an idolatry of race." He struck out against the "iniquitous violence" and the "vile criminal actions" being perpetrated by German leaders, and he denounced the "pagan cult of race." The Nazis knew what he meant. The Reich and Prussian Minister for Ecclesiastical Affairs wrote to the German Foreign Ministry that Pacelli's "unmistakable allusion to Germany...was very well understood in the France Popular Front and the anti-German world."
What did the Nazis say about the Church prior to the war?
Herman Goering, a German World War I flying hero, was an early follower of Hitler. He was now Prussian Minister of the Interior, and in that role he made a filmed statement in which he said, “I shall sweep clean and remove from office all those Communists and Catholics who are opposing are national endeavors.”
[re Concordat] Hitler, who never intended to keep his promises, was happy to accept all of the Church’s long-standing demands. (“I will be one of the few men in history who have deceived the Vatican,” he boasted shortly after signing the concordat.)
Hermann Goering complained [in mid-1930s] that: “Catholic believers carry away one impression from attendance at divine services and that is that the Catholic Church rejects the institutions of the Nationalist State. How could it be otherwise when they are continuously engaging in polemics on political questions or events in their sermons....hardly a Sunday passes but that they abuse the so-called religious atmosphere of divine service in order to read pastoral letters on purely political subjects.” Adolf Wagner, Bavarian Minister of the Interior, said “there will be no peace in Germany until all the political priests are driven out and exterminated”
Das Schwarze Korps called it [Mit Brennender Sorge] "the most incredible of Pius XI's pastoral letters; every sentence in it was an insult to the new Germany."
In May [1937], Hitler was quoted in a Swiss newspaper as saying, "the Third Reich does not desire a modus vivendi with the Catholic Church, but rather its destruction with lies and dishonor, in order to make room for a German Church in which the German race will be glorified."
What did Catholics do to help the Jews during the war? (this is but a small sample)
Fifty years after the Nazis occupied Italy, Don Aldo Brunacci stated: "We not only placed the Jews in convents but also in private houses, and in hotels. I had one family in my house. There were moments of terror like when the police came to my house to take me for questioning on Mary 15, 1944. I quickly shut the door to the study and left with the police so they did not find them. This family then went to seek help from the bishop who said: 'As you can see, my house is full of refugees, but I still have my bed and my study. From now on I can sleep in my study on the couch, and you can take my bedroom.'" Personal documents belonging to the Jews, as well as their sacred books and religious objects, were hidden in the cellar of the bishop's residence until the Liberation.
In September1942 when Eichmann’s men arrested six stateless Jewish families, the French agents--being French--conceded to the deportees the choice of taking their children with them or leaving them behind and gave them an hour to make up their minds. It was night, but they woke up Cardinal Gerlier, the Archbishop of Lyons, who also served a chairman of Amitie Chretienne, a relief organization for Jewish refugees. At the hapless parents’ request, the Cardinal took the nine children into his home, pledge himself for their safety--and promised in writing not to have them baptized. Four days later when the Prefect, on Eichmann’s orders, came to the Cardinal’s house to collect the children, they were gone. To the demand for their address, Gerlier replied, (and quoting himself in the subsequent report to the Vatican) “Monsieur le Prefet, I would not consider myself worthy to be the Archbishop of Lyons if I complied with your request. Good day.”
[Nuncio] Roncalli in Istanbul wrote to Barlas of the Jewish Agency on May 22, 1943: “I am very happy to be able to inform you that according to reports received from Bratislava, the deportations of Jews have been suspended for the time being, as a result of the intervention of the Holy See.”
Angelo Roncalli (the future Pope John XXIII), war time apostolic delegate in Istanbul, made a very similar statement concerning his efforts to save Jewish lives: “In all these painful matters I have referred to the Holy See and simply carried out the Pope’s orders: first and foremost to save Jewish lives.”
The case of Fr. Pere Jacques of Jesus (of the Carmelite order) illustrates the risks that clergy took when they hid Jewish people from the Nazis. Fr. Jacques was headmaster at a boys school in Avon, France, when the Nazis invaded. As the deportations began, he agreed to hide Jews, seminarians facing deportation, and Resistance fugitives. When he was questioned about taking such chances, he said: "If by chance I were shot, I would be leaving my pupils an example worth more to them than all the instruction I could give." In January 1944, the Gestapo conducted a raid. When Fr. Jacques and three Jewish boys were being taken away, he called to the remaining children, "Au revoir, les enfants." He died in German custody, having spent his final days comforting other prisoners.
On October 31 [1944], President Roosevelt's representative to the Pope, Myron Taylor, transmitted a report to the director of the Committee for Refugees in Washington: "I also want to pay tribute to many non-Jewish groups and individuals who have shown a true Christian spirit in their quick and friendly reaction in support of the helpless of Europe...The record of the Catholic Church in this regard has been inspiring. All over Europe, Catholic priests have furnished hiding places and protection to the persecuted. His Holiness, Pope Pius XII, has interceded on many occasions in behalf of refugees in danger."
[Dr. Robert Kempner, Deputy Chief US Prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials] “The archives of the Vatican, of the diocesan authorities and of Ribbentrop’s foreign ministry contain a whole series of protest--direct and indirect, diplomatic and public, secret and open....All the arguments and writings eventually used by the Catholic Church only provoked suicide; the execution of Jews was followed by that of Catholic priests.”
In a letter to the editor of La Republicca, Ines Gistron wrote" "Monsignor O'Flaherty placed me and my Jewish friend in a pensione run by Canadian nuns at Monteverde (Rome). We were given false IDs. We lived with the elderly women and young ladies, completely separated from the nuns in the cloister. After the Nazis began searching for Jews, the pensione was so filled that the Holy Father ordered the cloistered areas to be opened in order to provide for more refugees. I gave my room to a woman with two children and went to live in a very small cell."
Pontecovo sent a letter, dated July 23, 1999, to Margherita Marchione with the following testimonial: “I was one of those saved by the Vatican. In October 1943, my father sent me (I was eight years old) and my brother Bruno (four and a half) to the boarding school of the Sisters Oblates of Mary in Rome, Via delle Mura Aureliane, where we remained until June 4, 1944. Only the principal and her assistant knew we were Jewish. We were well received and lived a normal life. We missed our parents who were with Catholic friends, hidden in a sealed room. We were happy and followed the routine of the other children with morning and evening prayers, Mass, and participation in processions dressed as altar boys! Our stay was rich with episodes both moving and entertaining...”
...Gideon Hausner, Israeli General Prosecutor at Adolf Eichmann’s trial (October 18, 1961): “The Italian clergy helped numerous Jews and hid them in monasteries, and the Pope intervened personally in support of those arrested by the Nazis.”
In his final summary at the end of the war (1945) the executive director of the War Refugee Board, John W. Phele says: “The Holy See and the Vatican hierarchy throughout Europe were solicited time and again or special assistance both as a channel of communication to the leaders and people of enemy territory and as a means of rendering direct aid to the suffering victims of Hitler. The Catholic clergy saved and protected many thousands and the Vatican rendered invaluable assistance to the Board and to the persecuted in Nazi hands.”
...Mr. Gideon Hausner, the Attorney General, in Israel’s trial against Adolf Eichmann: “Pressure was exerted through Church circles, the Slovakian Government began to have doubts about continuing the deportations. Ludin, the German Ambassador, reported that owing to the influence of the Church and the corruption of the Slovakian administration, the 35,000 Jews remaining in Slovakia had been issued with documents exempting them from deportation.”
Fifty years after the Nazis occupied Italy, Don Aldo Brunacci stated: "We not only placed the Jews in convents but also in private houses, and in hotels. I had one family in my house. There were moments of terror like when the police came to my house to take me for questioning on Mary 15, 1944. I quickly shut the door to the study and left with the police so they did not find them. This family then went to seek help from the bishop who said: 'As you can see, my house is full of refugees, but I still have my bed and my study. From now on I can sleep in my study on the couch, and you can take my bedroom.'" Personal documents belonging to the Jews, as well as their sacred books and religious objects, were hidden in the cellar of the bishop's residence until the Liberation.
In September1942 when Eichmann’s men arrested six stateless Jewish families, the French agents--being French--conceded to the deportees the choice of taking their children with them or leaving them behind and gave them an hour to make up their minds. It was night, but they woke up Cardinal Gerlier, the Archbishop of Lyons, who also served a chairman of Amitie Chretienne, a relief organization for Jewish refugees. At the hapless parents’ request, the Cardinal took the nine children into his home, pledge himself for their safety--and promised in writing not to have them baptized. Four days later when the Prefect, on Eichmann’s orders, came to the Cardinal’s house to collect the children, they were gone. To the demand for their address, Gerlier replied, (and quoting himself in the subsequent report to the Vatican) “Monsieur le Prefet, I would not consider myself worthy to be the Archbishop of Lyons if I complied with your request. Good day.”
[Nuncio] Roncalli in Istanbul wrote to Barlas of the Jewish Agency on May 22, 1943: “I am very happy to be able to inform you that according to reports received from Bratislava, the deportations of Jews have been suspended for the time being, as a result of the intervention of the Holy See.”
Angelo Roncalli (the future Pope John XXIII), war time apostolic delegate in Istanbul, made a very similar statement concerning his efforts to save Jewish lives: “In all these painful matters I have referred to the Holy See and simply carried out the Pope’s orders: first and foremost to save Jewish lives.”
The case of Fr. Pere Jacques of Jesus (of the Carmelite order) illustrates the risks that clergy took when they hid Jewish people from the Nazis. Fr. Jacques was headmaster at a boys school in Avon, France, when the Nazis invaded. As the deportations began, he agreed to hide Jews, seminarians facing deportation, and Resistance fugitives. When he was questioned about taking such chances, he said: "If by chance I were shot, I would be leaving my pupils an example worth more to them than all the instruction I could give." In January 1944, the Gestapo conducted a raid. When Fr. Jacques and three Jewish boys were being taken away, he called to the remaining children, "Au revoir, les enfants." He died in German custody, having spent his final days comforting other prisoners.
On October 31 [1944], President Roosevelt's representative to the Pope, Myron Taylor, transmitted a report to the director of the Committee for Refugees in Washington: "I also want to pay tribute to many non-Jewish groups and individuals who have shown a true Christian spirit in their quick and friendly reaction in support of the helpless of Europe...The record of the Catholic Church in this regard has been inspiring. All over Europe, Catholic priests have furnished hiding places and protection to the persecuted. His Holiness, Pope Pius XII, has interceded on many occasions in behalf of refugees in danger."
[Dr. Robert Kempner, Deputy Chief US Prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials] “The archives of the Vatican, of the diocesan authorities and of Ribbentrop’s foreign ministry contain a whole series of protest--direct and indirect, diplomatic and public, secret and open....All the arguments and writings eventually used by the Catholic Church only provoked suicide; the execution of Jews was followed by that of Catholic priests.”
In a letter to the editor of La Republicca, Ines Gistron wrote" "Monsignor O'Flaherty placed me and my Jewish friend in a pensione run by Canadian nuns at Monteverde (Rome). We were given false IDs. We lived with the elderly women and young ladies, completely separated from the nuns in the cloister. After the Nazis began searching for Jews, the pensione was so filled that the Holy Father ordered the cloistered areas to be opened in order to provide for more refugees. I gave my room to a woman with two children and went to live in a very small cell."
Pontecovo sent a letter, dated July 23, 1999, to Margherita Marchione with the following testimonial: “I was one of those saved by the Vatican. In October 1943, my father sent me (I was eight years old) and my brother Bruno (four and a half) to the boarding school of the Sisters Oblates of Mary in Rome, Via delle Mura Aureliane, where we remained until June 4, 1944. Only the principal and her assistant knew we were Jewish. We were well received and lived a normal life. We missed our parents who were with Catholic friends, hidden in a sealed room. We were happy and followed the routine of the other children with morning and evening prayers, Mass, and participation in processions dressed as altar boys! Our stay was rich with episodes both moving and entertaining...”
...Gideon Hausner, Israeli General Prosecutor at Adolf Eichmann’s trial (October 18, 1961): “The Italian clergy helped numerous Jews and hid them in monasteries, and the Pope intervened personally in support of those arrested by the Nazis.”
In his final summary at the end of the war (1945) the executive director of the War Refugee Board, John W. Phele says: “The Holy See and the Vatican hierarchy throughout Europe were solicited time and again or special assistance both as a channel of communication to the leaders and people of enemy territory and as a means of rendering direct aid to the suffering victims of Hitler. The Catholic clergy saved and protected many thousands and the Vatican rendered invaluable assistance to the Board and to the persecuted in Nazi hands.”
...Mr. Gideon Hausner, the Attorney General, in Israel’s trial against Adolf Eichmann: “Pressure was exerted through Church circles, the Slovakian Government began to have doubts about continuing the deportations. Ludin, the German Ambassador, reported that owing to the influence of the Church and the corruption of the Slovakian administration, the 35,000 Jews remaining in Slovakia had been issued with documents exempting them from deportation.”
What did the Church say during the war?
Shortly after the Germans took over [France], Pius XII sent a secret letter to the Catholic bishops of Europe entitled Opere et Caritate (By Work and by Love). In it, he instructed the bishops to help all who were suffering racial discrimination at the hands of the Nazis. They were instructed to read the letter in their Churches in order to remind the faithful that racism is "incompatible with the teachings of the Catholic Church."
[September 1940] Vatican Radio reported that "Hitler's war unfortunately is not a just war" and that "God's blessing therefore cannot be upon it."
When Ribbentrop called on March 11 [1940], Pius XII repeatedly protested against the treatment of Jews, but Ribbentrop responded by speaking of the invincibility of the Reich and the inevitability of a German victory. This invitation to join the winning side did not get the response Ribbentrop may have expected. “The Pope heard him out in stony silence, opened his drawer and began a recital--in perfect German--of all the racial persecutions and violations of the concordats, both the German and Polish ones, committed by the Nazis, quoting the dates and particulars of all major crimes. The audience ended with a curt nod from Pius. Ribbentrop is said to have felt faint when he left the Pope.”
...in October 1942, when deportations had removed some 14,000 Jews, the Primate of Belgium addressed a clandestine meeting of the Action Catholique in Brussels as follows: “It is forbidden for Catholics to collaborate in the foundation of an oppressive government. It is obligatory for all Catholics to work against such a regime.”
In his 1942 Christmas statement, broadcast over Vatican Radio, Pope Pius XII said...that mankind owed this vow to all victims of the war, including "the hundreds of thousands who, through no fault of their own, and solely because of their nation or race have been condemned to death or progressive extinction." In making this statement, Pius used the Latin word "stirps," which means race, but which had been used throughout Europe for centuries as an explicit reference to Jews.
Pope Pius himself weighed in on the matter with a letter, dated April 7, 1943, to the Slovak government: "The Holy See has always entertained the firm hope that the Slovak government...would never proceed with the forcible removal of persons belonging to the Jewish race...The Holy See would fail in its Divine Mandate if it did not deplore these measures, which gravely damage man in his natural right, mainly for the reason that these people belong to a certain race."
Prime Minister Kallay of Hungary met with Pius in April 1943 at which, “He [the pope] condemned the system and methods of the Germans which independent of the war were inhuman and brutal, especially toward the Jews....the Roman Church could never cooperate with Governments which followed methods like Germany’s or Russia’s and built up their systems on those methods.”
Late in June 1943, the Vatican Radio warned the French people that "he who makes a distinction between Jews and other men is unfaithful to God and is in conflict with God's commands."
In November 1944, the Holy See sent a note expressing "deep sorrow" and hope that the Slovak government would assure that "Jews who are still in the territory...may not be subjected to even more severe sufferings." The note concluded: "The Holy See, moved by those sentiments of humanity and Christian charity that always inspire its work in favor of those who are suffering, without distinction of religion, nationality or race, will continue also in the future, in spite of the growing difficulties of communications, to follow with particular attention the fate of Jews of Slovakia, and will do everything in its power to bring them relief."
What did the French bishops say during the war?
“Gerlier [Cardinal of Lyons] defied the authorities with an open letter of sympathy to the Grand Rabbi of France, after a crude Nazi attempt to burn the synagogues of Paris in October 1941. ‘Catholics are deeply affected,’ he wrote to the Chief Rabbi, ‘by the tragedy which has befallen the people of Israel.’ Subsequently in a pastoral letter, the Primate of France called upon all French Catholics to refuse to surrender to the authorities the hidden children of deported Jews. Apparently he had no need to ask them to shelter Jews for, as Leon Poliakov, himself a Maquis officer, states: ‘Priest, members of the religious orders and laymen were rivals in giving asylum, thereby saving, as Mauriac wrote, the honor of French Catholics. The saving of their honor saved tens of thousands of Jewish lives.”
Bishop Pierre-Marie Theas sent a letter [in 1942] to the priests of the Diocese of Montauban to be read to their congregations: “I raise my voice in protest, and I assert that all men, Aryans and non-Aryans, are brothers...anti-Semitic pressures flout human dignity and violate the most sacred rights of the human person and family.”
On July 16, 1942, at 3:00 in the morning, French police officers spread out through Paris, rounded up 13,000 Jews, and locked them in a sports facility known as the Velodrome d'Hiver. The French bishops issued a joint protest which stated: "The mass arrest of the Jews last week and the ill-treatment to which they were subjected, particularly in the Paris Velodrome d'Hiver, has deeply shocked us. There were scenes of unspeakable horror when the deported parents were separated from their children. Our Christian conscience cries out in horror. In the name of humanity and Christian principles we demand the inalienable rights of all individuals. From the depths of our hearts we pray Catholics to express their sympathy for the immense injury to so many Jewish mothers."
Archbishop Saliege of Toulouse also protested [in 1942] against the deportations. He wrote a stirring letter which was read from all the pulpits in his diocese and broadcast over Vatican Radio: "It has been reserved to our time to witness the sad spectacle of children, of women, of fathers and mothers, being treated like a heard of beasts; to see members of the same family separated one from another and shipped away to an unknown destination...Jews are men, Jewesses are women... They cannot be maltreated at will...They are part of the human race. They are our brethren as much as are so many others. A Christian cannot forget that."
What did the American Bishops say during WWII?
A statement by the US Catholic Bishops was issued toward the end of 1942: "Since the murderous assault on Poland, utterly devoid of every semblance of humanity, there has been a premeditated and systematic extermination of the people of this nation. The same satanic technique is being applied to many other peoples. We feel a deep sense of revulsion against the cruel indignities heaped upon Jews in conquered countries and upon defenseless peoples not of our faith.... Deeply moved by the arrest and maltreatment of the Jews, we cannot stifle the cry of conscience. In the name of humanity and Christian principles, our voice is raised."
In June [1943] Cardinal Spellman, archbishop of New York, made a broadcast to Hungary in which he echoed Pius XI and Pius XII as well as Holy Scripture. “Abraham is our Patriarch, our ancestor. Anti-Semitism is not compatible with this sublime reality. Spiritually, we are Semites. No man can love God and hate his brother.” Asked why he had done it, Cardinal Spellman replied: “I made the broadcast at the request of Pius XII to protest the bloody persecution of Hungarian Jews.”
Shortly after the Germans took over [France], Pius XII sent a secret letter to the Catholic bishops of Europe entitled Opere et Caritate (By Work and by Love). In it, he instructed the bishops to help all who were suffering racial discrimination at the hands of the Nazis. They were instructed to read the letter in their Churches in order to remind the faithful that racism is "incompatible with the teachings of the Catholic Church."
[September 1940] Vatican Radio reported that "Hitler's war unfortunately is not a just war" and that "God's blessing therefore cannot be upon it."
When Ribbentrop called on March 11 [1940], Pius XII repeatedly protested against the treatment of Jews, but Ribbentrop responded by speaking of the invincibility of the Reich and the inevitability of a German victory. This invitation to join the winning side did not get the response Ribbentrop may have expected. “The Pope heard him out in stony silence, opened his drawer and began a recital--in perfect German--of all the racial persecutions and violations of the concordats, both the German and Polish ones, committed by the Nazis, quoting the dates and particulars of all major crimes. The audience ended with a curt nod from Pius. Ribbentrop is said to have felt faint when he left the Pope.”
...in October 1942, when deportations had removed some 14,000 Jews, the Primate of Belgium addressed a clandestine meeting of the Action Catholique in Brussels as follows: “It is forbidden for Catholics to collaborate in the foundation of an oppressive government. It is obligatory for all Catholics to work against such a regime.”
In his 1942 Christmas statement, broadcast over Vatican Radio, Pope Pius XII said...that mankind owed this vow to all victims of the war, including "the hundreds of thousands who, through no fault of their own, and solely because of their nation or race have been condemned to death or progressive extinction." In making this statement, Pius used the Latin word "stirps," which means race, but which had been used throughout Europe for centuries as an explicit reference to Jews.
Pope Pius himself weighed in on the matter with a letter, dated April 7, 1943, to the Slovak government: "The Holy See has always entertained the firm hope that the Slovak government...would never proceed with the forcible removal of persons belonging to the Jewish race...The Holy See would fail in its Divine Mandate if it did not deplore these measures, which gravely damage man in his natural right, mainly for the reason that these people belong to a certain race."
Prime Minister Kallay of Hungary met with Pius in April 1943 at which, “He [the pope] condemned the system and methods of the Germans which independent of the war were inhuman and brutal, especially toward the Jews....the Roman Church could never cooperate with Governments which followed methods like Germany’s or Russia’s and built up their systems on those methods.”
Late in June 1943, the Vatican Radio warned the French people that "he who makes a distinction between Jews and other men is unfaithful to God and is in conflict with God's commands."
In November 1944, the Holy See sent a note expressing "deep sorrow" and hope that the Slovak government would assure that "Jews who are still in the territory...may not be subjected to even more severe sufferings." The note concluded: "The Holy See, moved by those sentiments of humanity and Christian charity that always inspire its work in favor of those who are suffering, without distinction of religion, nationality or race, will continue also in the future, in spite of the growing difficulties of communications, to follow with particular attention the fate of Jews of Slovakia, and will do everything in its power to bring them relief."
What did the French bishops say during the war?
“Gerlier [Cardinal of Lyons] defied the authorities with an open letter of sympathy to the Grand Rabbi of France, after a crude Nazi attempt to burn the synagogues of Paris in October 1941. ‘Catholics are deeply affected,’ he wrote to the Chief Rabbi, ‘by the tragedy which has befallen the people of Israel.’ Subsequently in a pastoral letter, the Primate of France called upon all French Catholics to refuse to surrender to the authorities the hidden children of deported Jews. Apparently he had no need to ask them to shelter Jews for, as Leon Poliakov, himself a Maquis officer, states: ‘Priest, members of the religious orders and laymen were rivals in giving asylum, thereby saving, as Mauriac wrote, the honor of French Catholics. The saving of their honor saved tens of thousands of Jewish lives.”
Bishop Pierre-Marie Theas sent a letter [in 1942] to the priests of the Diocese of Montauban to be read to their congregations: “I raise my voice in protest, and I assert that all men, Aryans and non-Aryans, are brothers...anti-Semitic pressures flout human dignity and violate the most sacred rights of the human person and family.”
On July 16, 1942, at 3:00 in the morning, French police officers spread out through Paris, rounded up 13,000 Jews, and locked them in a sports facility known as the Velodrome d'Hiver. The French bishops issued a joint protest which stated: "The mass arrest of the Jews last week and the ill-treatment to which they were subjected, particularly in the Paris Velodrome d'Hiver, has deeply shocked us. There were scenes of unspeakable horror when the deported parents were separated from their children. Our Christian conscience cries out in horror. In the name of humanity and Christian principles we demand the inalienable rights of all individuals. From the depths of our hearts we pray Catholics to express their sympathy for the immense injury to so many Jewish mothers."
Archbishop Saliege of Toulouse also protested [in 1942] against the deportations. He wrote a stirring letter which was read from all the pulpits in his diocese and broadcast over Vatican Radio: "It has been reserved to our time to witness the sad spectacle of children, of women, of fathers and mothers, being treated like a heard of beasts; to see members of the same family separated one from another and shipped away to an unknown destination...Jews are men, Jewesses are women... They cannot be maltreated at will...They are part of the human race. They are our brethren as much as are so many others. A Christian cannot forget that."
What did the American Bishops say during WWII?
A statement by the US Catholic Bishops was issued toward the end of 1942: "Since the murderous assault on Poland, utterly devoid of every semblance of humanity, there has been a premeditated and systematic extermination of the people of this nation. The same satanic technique is being applied to many other peoples. We feel a deep sense of revulsion against the cruel indignities heaped upon Jews in conquered countries and upon defenseless peoples not of our faith.... Deeply moved by the arrest and maltreatment of the Jews, we cannot stifle the cry of conscience. In the name of humanity and Christian principles, our voice is raised."
In June [1943] Cardinal Spellman, archbishop of New York, made a broadcast to Hungary in which he echoed Pius XI and Pius XII as well as Holy Scripture. “Abraham is our Patriarch, our ancestor. Anti-Semitism is not compatible with this sublime reality. Spiritually, we are Semites. No man can love God and hate his brother.” Asked why he had done it, Cardinal Spellman replied: “I made the broadcast at the request of Pius XII to protest the bloody persecution of Hungarian Jews.”
What did Pius XII say regarding his “silence?”
On February 20, 1940, Pius wrote: "When the Pope would like to shout out loud and clear, holding back and silence are unhappily what are often imposed on him; where he would like to act and help, it is patience and waiting (that are imposed on him)."
[In response to details of concentration camps in 1942] The Pope, distressed by the shocking revelation, stated: "Perhaps my solemn protest might have obtained for me the approval of the civilized world, but it would have brought to the Jews a most implacable persecution, even greater than the one they are now suffering."
Pirro Scavizzi was a military chaplain attached to the hospital train of the Sovereign Order of Malta, which went to the Eastern front with Italian troops in 1942. He was used as clandestine courier to carry messages from the Polish bishops to the Vatican. Scavizzi said that when he told Pius about the conditions in Poland, the Pope replied, "Tell everyone...that many times have thought of hurling excommunications at Nazism, of denouncing the bestiality of the extermination of the Jews to the civilized world. Serious threats of reprisal have come to our ears, not against our person, but against our unhappy sons who are now under Nazi domination...After many tears and many prayers, I came to the conclusion that a protest from me would not only not help anyone, but would arouse the most ferocious anger against the Jews and multiply acts of cruelty because they are undefended. Perhaps my solemn protest would win me some praise from the civilized world, but would bring down on the poor Jews an even more implacable persecution than the one they are already enduring."
[Cardinal Paolo Dezza SJ on audience with the Pope] "In December of 1942, I gave a retreat for the Holy Father in the Vatican. On that occasion I had a long audience in which Pius XII, speaking about the Nazi atrocities in Germany and in other occupied countries, manifested his sorrow, his anguish. He said: 'They lament that the Pope does not speak. But the Pope cannot speak. If he were to speak, things would be worse.' And he reminded me that he had recently sent three letters in which he deplored Nazi atrocities" one to the person he defined as 'the heroic Archbishop of Krakow,' the future Cardinal Sapieha, and the others to two bishops in Poland. 'They responded,' he said, 'thanking me, but telling me that they could not publish those letters because it would aggravate the situation.' And he cited the example of Pius X who, when confronted with a problem in Russia said: 'You must keep silence in order to avoid worse evils.'"
[Re thousands of Dutch interned in concentration camps after Dutch bishops protest] The Pope prepared a document regarding Hitler's inhumanity against the Jews, which he wanted to publish in L'Osservatore Romano. However, according to Mother Pascalina, Pius XII burned the document. She recalls that he felt it would have triggered many more deaths and he should not assume responsibility for them. When Mother Pascalina reminded him that the document would be useful in he future, he answered: " But if the Nazis find these sheets which are stronger than the bishops' letter, what will happen to the Catholics and the Jews under German control?" Instead, Pope Pius XII asked Archbishop Amleto Cicognani, Apostolic Delegate in Washington, D.C., to have the Dutch protest printed and circulated by the American press.
[Pius XII in address to College of Cardinals June 2, 1943] "Every single word in Our statements addressed to the competent authorities, and every one of Our public utterances, has had to be weighed and pondered by Us with deep gravity, in the very interest of those who are suffering, so as not to render their position even more difficult and unbearable than before, be it unwittingly and unintentionally."
In an address to the College of Cardinals distributed clandestinely in Poland, June 3, 1943, His holiness noted that "every word on our part, addressed on this subject to competent authorities, every public allusion, has to be seriously weighed and measured by us, in the interest of the suffering themselves, so as not to render their lot still graver and more unbearable."
The Pope warned the cardinals [in 1943] to be cautious about what they said, "Every word we address to the competent authority on this subject [Jews], and all our public utterances, have to carefully weighed and measured by us in the interests of the victims themselves, lest, contrary to our intentions, we make their situation worse and harder to bear." (
Pius made a similar private statement during the war to a chaplain who reported to him on the conditions in Poland: “Please tell everyone, everyone you can, that the Pope suffers agony on their behalf. Many times I have thought of scorching Nazism with the lightning of excommunication and denouncing to the civilized world the criminality of the extermination of the Jews. We have heard of the very serious threat of retaliation, not on our person but on the poor sons who are under the Nazi domination. We have received through various channels urgent recommendations that the Holy See should not take a drastic stand. After many tears and many prayers, I have judged that a protest of mine not only would fail to help anyone, but would create even more fury against the Jews, multiplying acts of cruelty.”
He [Pius XII] said: “No doubt a protest would have gained me the praise and respect of the civilized world, but it would have submitted the poor Jews to an even worse fate.”
13 Years after the war--what did the Jews say?
What did the Jews say when Pius XII died?
[After the Pope's death in 1958 Golda Meir] "We share in the grief of humanity a the passing away of His Holiness, Pope Pius XII. In a generation afflicted by wars and discords he upheld the highest ideals of peace and compassion. When fearful martyrdom came to our people in the decade of Nazi terror, the voice of the Pope was raised for its victims. The life of our times was enriched by a voice speaking out about great moral truths above the tumult of daily conflict. We mourn a great servant of peace."
Dr. William F. Rosenblum, in his sermon at Temple Israel in New York City on October 12, 1958, spoke about Pope Pius XII who made it possible for "thousands of Jewish victims of Nazism and Fascism to be hidden away in monasteries and convents of the various Catholic orders and for Jewish children to be taken into Catholic orphanages." He paid tribute to the Pope as "a great religious leader whose works for brotherliness and peace in a time of crisis in our history should remain as an example to emulate."
The Chief Rabbi of Rome, Elio Toaff, upon learning of Pius XII’s death, said: “More than any other people, the Italian Jews had experienced the great pity and supreme generosity of the Pontiff during the unhappy years of persecution and terror, when it seemed to them that they had no way of escape. His Jewish compatriots will everlastingly remember with gratitude the papal ruling to open the doors of convents and parish houses to them. The Jewish community is in mourning for the death of Pope Pius XII, and with sincere sentiments it raises its prayers to the Lord that He may grant His generous and chosen soul every beatitude.”
As The Jewish Post (Winnipeg) reported in its November 6, 1958 edition: “It is understandable why the death of Pope Pius XII should have called forth expressions of sincere grief from practically all sections of American Jewry. For there probably was not a single ruler of our generation who did more to help the Jews in their hour of greatest tragedy, during the Nazi occupation of Europe, than the late Pope.”
On February 20, 1940, Pius wrote: "When the Pope would like to shout out loud and clear, holding back and silence are unhappily what are often imposed on him; where he would like to act and help, it is patience and waiting (that are imposed on him)."
[In response to details of concentration camps in 1942] The Pope, distressed by the shocking revelation, stated: "Perhaps my solemn protest might have obtained for me the approval of the civilized world, but it would have brought to the Jews a most implacable persecution, even greater than the one they are now suffering."
Pirro Scavizzi was a military chaplain attached to the hospital train of the Sovereign Order of Malta, which went to the Eastern front with Italian troops in 1942. He was used as clandestine courier to carry messages from the Polish bishops to the Vatican. Scavizzi said that when he told Pius about the conditions in Poland, the Pope replied, "Tell everyone...that many times have thought of hurling excommunications at Nazism, of denouncing the bestiality of the extermination of the Jews to the civilized world. Serious threats of reprisal have come to our ears, not against our person, but against our unhappy sons who are now under Nazi domination...After many tears and many prayers, I came to the conclusion that a protest from me would not only not help anyone, but would arouse the most ferocious anger against the Jews and multiply acts of cruelty because they are undefended. Perhaps my solemn protest would win me some praise from the civilized world, but would bring down on the poor Jews an even more implacable persecution than the one they are already enduring."
[Cardinal Paolo Dezza SJ on audience with the Pope] "In December of 1942, I gave a retreat for the Holy Father in the Vatican. On that occasion I had a long audience in which Pius XII, speaking about the Nazi atrocities in Germany and in other occupied countries, manifested his sorrow, his anguish. He said: 'They lament that the Pope does not speak. But the Pope cannot speak. If he were to speak, things would be worse.' And he reminded me that he had recently sent three letters in which he deplored Nazi atrocities" one to the person he defined as 'the heroic Archbishop of Krakow,' the future Cardinal Sapieha, and the others to two bishops in Poland. 'They responded,' he said, 'thanking me, but telling me that they could not publish those letters because it would aggravate the situation.' And he cited the example of Pius X who, when confronted with a problem in Russia said: 'You must keep silence in order to avoid worse evils.'"
[Re thousands of Dutch interned in concentration camps after Dutch bishops protest] The Pope prepared a document regarding Hitler's inhumanity against the Jews, which he wanted to publish in L'Osservatore Romano. However, according to Mother Pascalina, Pius XII burned the document. She recalls that he felt it would have triggered many more deaths and he should not assume responsibility for them. When Mother Pascalina reminded him that the document would be useful in he future, he answered: " But if the Nazis find these sheets which are stronger than the bishops' letter, what will happen to the Catholics and the Jews under German control?" Instead, Pope Pius XII asked Archbishop Amleto Cicognani, Apostolic Delegate in Washington, D.C., to have the Dutch protest printed and circulated by the American press.
[Pius XII in address to College of Cardinals June 2, 1943] "Every single word in Our statements addressed to the competent authorities, and every one of Our public utterances, has had to be weighed and pondered by Us with deep gravity, in the very interest of those who are suffering, so as not to render their position even more difficult and unbearable than before, be it unwittingly and unintentionally."
In an address to the College of Cardinals distributed clandestinely in Poland, June 3, 1943, His holiness noted that "every word on our part, addressed on this subject to competent authorities, every public allusion, has to be seriously weighed and measured by us, in the interest of the suffering themselves, so as not to render their lot still graver and more unbearable."
The Pope warned the cardinals [in 1943] to be cautious about what they said, "Every word we address to the competent authority on this subject [Jews], and all our public utterances, have to carefully weighed and measured by us in the interests of the victims themselves, lest, contrary to our intentions, we make their situation worse and harder to bear." (
Pius made a similar private statement during the war to a chaplain who reported to him on the conditions in Poland: “Please tell everyone, everyone you can, that the Pope suffers agony on their behalf. Many times I have thought of scorching Nazism with the lightning of excommunication and denouncing to the civilized world the criminality of the extermination of the Jews. We have heard of the very serious threat of retaliation, not on our person but on the poor sons who are under the Nazi domination. We have received through various channels urgent recommendations that the Holy See should not take a drastic stand. After many tears and many prayers, I have judged that a protest of mine not only would fail to help anyone, but would create even more fury against the Jews, multiplying acts of cruelty.”
He [Pius XII] said: “No doubt a protest would have gained me the praise and respect of the civilized world, but it would have submitted the poor Jews to an even worse fate.”
13 Years after the war--what did the Jews say?
What did the Jews say when Pius XII died?
[After the Pope's death in 1958 Golda Meir] "We share in the grief of humanity a the passing away of His Holiness, Pope Pius XII. In a generation afflicted by wars and discords he upheld the highest ideals of peace and compassion. When fearful martyrdom came to our people in the decade of Nazi terror, the voice of the Pope was raised for its victims. The life of our times was enriched by a voice speaking out about great moral truths above the tumult of daily conflict. We mourn a great servant of peace."
Dr. William F. Rosenblum, in his sermon at Temple Israel in New York City on October 12, 1958, spoke about Pope Pius XII who made it possible for "thousands of Jewish victims of Nazism and Fascism to be hidden away in monasteries and convents of the various Catholic orders and for Jewish children to be taken into Catholic orphanages." He paid tribute to the Pope as "a great religious leader whose works for brotherliness and peace in a time of crisis in our history should remain as an example to emulate."
The Chief Rabbi of Rome, Elio Toaff, upon learning of Pius XII’s death, said: “More than any other people, the Italian Jews had experienced the great pity and supreme generosity of the Pontiff during the unhappy years of persecution and terror, when it seemed to them that they had no way of escape. His Jewish compatriots will everlastingly remember with gratitude the papal ruling to open the doors of convents and parish houses to them. The Jewish community is in mourning for the death of Pope Pius XII, and with sincere sentiments it raises its prayers to the Lord that He may grant His generous and chosen soul every beatitude.”
As The Jewish Post (Winnipeg) reported in its November 6, 1958 edition: “It is understandable why the death of Pope Pius XII should have called forth expressions of sincere grief from practically all sections of American Jewry. For there probably was not a single ruler of our generation who did more to help the Jews in their hour of greatest tragedy, during the Nazi occupation of Europe, than the late Pope.”